The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight: Our summary of the news; then the latest on Iraq from Somini Sengupta of the New York Times in Baghdad; a look at last week's international AIDS conference with three people who were there; a report from California on raising money for schools in poor neighborhoods; a campaign ad watch perusal of appeals to the ever desirable swing voter; and a second look at a Richard Rodriguez essay on gay marriage and the American family.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: New attacks in Iraq took a mounting toll on government officials and police today. In Baghdad, a suicide bomber blew up a fuel truck near a police station. At least nine people were killed, 60 others wounded, including number of police officers. The blast leveled buildings and hurled wreckage hundreds of yards away. It came hours after gunmen killed the country's head of military supplies. Also today, officials in Fallujah found the body of a police chief kidnapped Saturday in a nearby town. Yesterday a U.S. air strike in Fallujah killed 14 people. The U.S. Military said the targets were militants. The mayor said the victims were civilians. An Iraqi newspaper linked to radical Shiite Moqtada al-Sadr is officially back in business. U.S. officials closed it in March. They claimed it was inciting violence against American troops. On Sunday, Prime Minister Allawi ordered it reopened. He said he wanted to show his "absolute belief" in freedom of the press. The Philippines withdrew the last of its 51 peacekeepers from Iraq today. Their convoy crossed the border into Kuwait. That met a key demand of kidnappers holding a Filipino truck driver hostage. There was no immediate word on when he might be freed. And kidnappers did release an Egyptian hostage held since July 6. Al-Jazeera Television showed him being driven into the Egyptian embassy. We'll have more on events in Iraq right after this News Summary.

Back in this country, a U.S. Marine who disappeared in Iraq last month went before reporters today. Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun was reported missing on June 21. Later, an Iraqi group claimed to be holding him. More than two weeks later, he turned up in Beirut, Lebanon, where he has family. Hassoun spoke today at the marine base at Quantico, Virginia.

CORPORAL WASSEF ALI HASSOUN: I did not desert my post. I was captured and held against my will by anti-coalition forces for 19 days. This was a very difficult and challenging time for me. Since my release I've been fully participating in the repatriation process. I thank everyone who was looking for me and give thanks for God for everything.

JIM LEHRER: A Marine Corps spokesman said investigators are still examining Hassoun's story. He said that process could take weeks or even months. Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat tried to restore calm in Gaza today. There were angry protests of corruption over the weekend. They began after Arafat named a cousin to be security chief in Gaza. Today he brought back the previous security chief, and kept the cousin in a separate post. But it wasn't enough for Palestinian Prime Minister Qureia. He said he still wants to resign because of the chaos. A car bomb killed a senior Hezbollah guerrilla in Lebanon today. It happened in southern Beirut. Another Muslim group claimed responsibility, but the leader of Hezbollah accused Israel. The Israeli army denied it. Hundreds of people were kept from their homes in southern California today, as a wildfire threatened their neighborhoods. The fire started Saturday in northern Los Angeles County, near Santa Clarita. As of today, more than 1,500 firefighters were on the line. They had the blaze nearly 40 percent contained, despite dry, windy weather. It was one of several fires across California that have already burned more than 40,000 acres.

On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost more than 45 points to close at 10,094. The NASDAQ rose a fraction of a point to close above 1883. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to the latest from Iraq, the AIDS conference, under funded schools, ads for the swing vote, and a Richard Rodriguez essay.

UPDATE - STRUGGLE FOR STABILITY

JIM LEHRER: Now, to our update on the situation in Iraq. Gwen Ifill spoke with New York Times reporter Somini Sengupta in Baghdad earlier this evening.

GWEN IFILL:Somini Sengupta, welcome back. First of all, give us an update on the security situation right now in and around Baghdad.

SOMINI SENGUPTA: Yeah. This morning, Gwen, there was a car bomb at the usual bombing hour just after 8:00, when people were just getting ready to go to work, when the streets were very crowded. Casualties are maximized at that hour. A car bomb near a police station in the southwest corner of the city, a white tanker truck, apparently went in the direction of the police station, blasted away a whole row of car repair shops and tea stalls. At least nine people dead and a number of injured, about sixty people injured, though the death count might climb up still. This follows last night the assassination of a senior defense ministry official. On Saturday, as you know, there was an unsuccessful assassination attempt against the justice minister himself and last week, also the assassination of a provincial governor in Mosul just north of here. So while the formal occupation of Iraq ended on June 28, the insurgency against the continued presence of 140,000 U.S.-led troops here continues, and it's really picked up in the last few days, as we've seen the violence just go higher and higher.

GWEN IFILL: When you talk about all these separate events, do we have any way of knowing whether they're linked, whether the perpetrators are the same group of people?

SOMINI SENGUPTA: It's very hard to know if they're a part of one orchestrated, unified campaign. Certainly Zarqawi's group, connected to al-Qaida, has taken responsibility for some things, but not all things. As you know, at the same time there's been this string of hostage-taking, foreign hostages, both those who are nationals of countries that are part of the U.S.-led coalition, like the Philippines, like Bulgaria, but also nationals of countries that have had nothing to do with the U.S.-led war, but men, usually men from countries that are very poor, men who are here from Egypt and Pakistan and so on, to try to make a living, to try to make a buck. So tonight, we got news that the Egyptian hostage-- he was a truck driver who worked for a Saudi company-- he was released today. We are still awaiting word on the Filipino hostage. The last of the Filipino troops pulled out of Iraq today. They were a small contingent, about 51 troops, and they pulled out in response to the hostage takers.

GWEN IFILL: Prime Minister Allawi announced today, or today our time, that he would in fact reopen the newspaper that Moqtada al-Sadr, the Shiite cleric, had been running that had been closed by Paul Bremer because he said there was so much anti-U.S. sentiment in it. What is the significance, and how did that come about?

SOMINI SENGUPTA: Yeah, I mean, I think in that move you see the strategy that Allawi is trying to take to combat this insurgency, which appears to be a fairly fierce insurgency, on the one hand, announcing crackdown measures, strict emergency measures that would give him special powers, creating a new intelligence agency, but on the other hand trying to enter into political negotiations with his guerrilla enemies, and so announcing as he did yesterday that the Sadr newspaper would be allowed to resume publication was an attempt to bring him under the political tent. And Sadr, for his part, has suggested, has dangled all kinds of suggestions that he wants to take part in the political mainstream, but hasn't quite yet declared himself a player. So I think you're seeing from Allawi a mixture of kind of carrot and stick, if you will. He has also suggested that he willcome up with an amnesty offer and give amnesty to some insurgents in exchange for laying down their arms. He has not yet come up with a formal proposal. There was some suggestion by his president, Sheik Ghazi, that that proposal would be announced last week, but it hasn't been. So they seem to be a little stuck on that.

GWEN IFILL: Has there been any sense from Sadr, from the Sadr side of this equation, that he's accepting of this new government?

SOMINI SENGUPTA: Well, he has made... he has made a series of rather mixed statements. He has continued to call this government illegitimate, and yet he has also said that he will cooperate with the Iraqi police, most critically in Najaf, which is the key Shiite city in the south, where I made a trip to about two weeks ago. So there's been kind of mixed suggestions, and certainly you haven't seen the gun battles in Sadr's strongholds that you did see about a month ago, gun battles between U.S. forces and Sadr's militia, they're called the Mahdi Army. Certainly that seems to have tempered. There's a truce that's holding, Sadr's forces seem to have lost a lot of their strength, according to the Americans. So we'll see exactly how he responds to these various overtures that the Allawi government is making.

GWEN IFILL: And the U.S. role in Iraq has been very interesting over the last couple days. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage has visited, the new U.S. Ambassador Negroponte has made his first public statement. So they both seem to be very intent in their public statements on keeping a low profile.

SOMINI SENGUPTA: Absolutely. That's the message that the new U.S. Ambassador wants to send, that he is here as an ambassador to a sovereign country. He said, you know, this is not a super embassy; it's an embassy, an important embassy. It should be pointed out that this is one of the biggest U.S. embassies anywhere, and that the U.S. embassy is still occupying the presidential palace, which is a very symbolic place here; it was the seat of power for the coalition forces for the U.S. occupation authority. But I think the message has been very clear from the Americans that they are not going to be out front. The ambassador has not been appearing in press conferences, no television cameras were allowed in his Saturday meeting with journalists. And similarly I think you also see U.S. forces on the ground, on the streets of Baghdad at least, just taking a step back. They are still doing raids, they are still leading missions here, but they are slightly in the background and in their place you see Iraqi police, Iraqi soldiers doing the checkpoints, helping on the raids, doing patrols. And so as they are more and more on the front line, they're also getting hit. So today the tanker truck, the car bomb, was heading straight in the direction of a police station. A few days ago, in a city that's just south of here, there was an Iraqi national guard headquarters that was also hit by the insurgency. So they are being more and more targeted, both law enforcement authorities that are on the street as well as civilian government officials.

GWEN IFILL: Somini Sengupta, thank you so much.

SOMINI SENGUPTA: Thank you very much.

FOCUS - GLOBAL FIGHT

JIM LEHRER: Now, the aftermath of last week's international AIDS conference. Jeffrey brown has our story.

JEFFREY BROWN: As the world AIDS community met in Bangkok last week, the United Nations released grim new numbers: 2.9 million deaths from AIDS in 2003, and a record number of new infections, 4.8 million. The conference focused on the spread ofthe disease in Asia, and the continuing problem of access to drugs in developing countries. But the week was also marked by a bitter debate over funding available to fight AIDS, and whether the U.S. in particular is doing enough.

I'm joined by three prominent leaders in the field, just back from Bangkok. Dr. Anthony Fauci, of the National Institutes of Health, was a key member of the U.S. Government delegation. Dr. Helene Gayle is director of the HIV, TB, and Reproductive Health Program at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. And Stephen Lewis is the United Nations envoy on HIV and AIDS for Africa. Welcome to all of you. I'd like to start with the question of the increasing spread in Asia.

Dr. Fauci, what's behind that, what's going on?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, the numbers themselves are already quite concerning. But the issue regarding Asia is the enormous potential for an explosion, because of the population itself. The virus gets introduced into any given population by a number of means; it could be first injection drug use, it could be commercial sex workers, it could be gay men. But sooner or later what's happened in Africa, almost certainly is going to happen in some of the major Asian countries, namely spread into the general population through heterosexual contact, it's a very interesting pattern as that occurs, we've seen it in other countries and we're seeing it now. The issue with Asia is that we have the conference there. And it was in some respects fortuitous that we had it there, because right now is the time we need to do some major steps to contain the epidemic, not only with prevention, but also getting access of drugs to the people who are infected in Asia as well as, obviously, in sub-Saharan Africa.

JEFFREY BROWN: Dr. Gayle, some of the data I've seen suggest that some of what's going on in Asia right now is different somehow from what's happening in Africa. Is that true?

DR. HELENE GAYLE: Well, I think it's hard to compare won continent to another, particularly continents that are as heterogeneous as Africa and Asia, so I think you have to look at the picture country by country, and even in some countries state by state. For instance, India that now has the highest number of HIV infections in Asia and second highest the world, it's difficult to get the picture of what's going on in India if you look at the average HIV prevalence. For instance, less than one percent of people are infected overall in India, leading to five million people, given the large population size. But there are pockets in states and in districts in India where rates of HIV are much higher and increasing. So I think it's important to remember that it's hard to just look at any continent or any country without looking at it for the different patterns that you see throughout the country, and throughout the continent.

JEFFREY BROWN: Dr. Gayle, do you see countries taking actions in response, in Asia?

DR. HELENE GAYLE: Well, I think that one of the hallmarks of this epidemic is that no country has acted fast enough. And probably it's fair to say that no government has done enough soon enough. But I do think there are encouraging signs. While we were there in Bangkok for the conference, the premiere of China made a very encouraging statement about increasing commitment and increasing resources to fight HIV in China. The Indian government over the last few years, particularly in the last year, has made greater commitment than it has in the past. So I think we are starting to see encouraging signs, the closing speech by Mrs. Gandhi, for instance I think was a very encouraging sign about the commitment to the new government in India to fight HIV there. So we're starting to see those signs, but I think there's always more that can be done, both in terms of more resources, more accountability about how the resources are spent, and more overall political commitment.

JEFFREY BROWN: And, Stephen Lewis, how do you see what's happening in Asia, particularly how it could be prevented from becoming what you've seen so long in Africa?

STEPHEN LEWIS: I think Dr. Fauci's point was the valid point, that the pattern of explosion which occurs at a moment in time is now what confronts Asia, that whatever happened in Africa must not happen there. And that means the most intense series of preventive interventions. I was fascinated by the language of the conference which reverted to what we know of yore, injecting drug users, men having sex with men, commercial sex workers -- all the high risk groups, as they're called, that triggered so much of the pan department nick other parts of the world, now coming together in Asia and requiring the toughest preventive response.

JEFFREY BROWN: On the question of another issue that was in Bangkok, a question of access, and especially access to the life saving anti-retroviral drugs, Stephen Lewis, starting with you, the World Health Organization said last week that the world has "failed miserably" in getting these drugs to millions afflicted with HIV. I wonder, do you agree with that, and if so, why?

Mr. Lewis?

STEPHEN LEWIS: I'm sorry. You're addressing that to me. My connection is moving in and out. I think that we've simply never been able to get the resources on the ground. And we haven't been able to summon the supply lines of drugs in order to treat the millions of people we should now be treating, although the target of putting three million people into treatment by the end of 2005 is the most admirable target, and visionary commitment that's been made within the U.N. family in some time. And I think that if we can do that, largely using generics drugs, these fixed dose combinations as they're called, at very low prices, roughly $150 per person per year, then we can in fact reach the W HO target and have a sense of breakthrough in this dreadful pandemic.

JEFFREY BROWN: Dr. Fauci, how do you respond to this miserable failure language?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, miserable failure is a bit confrontative, particularly to the numbers of nations that have been doing a considerable amount. When you say enough, you never have enough until you have solved the problem. Certainly we have a long way to go. I don't think there's any question about that. We do have a long way to go. But what we've seen now, at least over the past year, are some promising signs. For example, there are a number of groups that global fund has now got money in the trenches, as we say, drugs are being bought, people are being treated. The president's emergency plan for AIDS relief, what we call PEPFAR, now has the money appropriated from our Congress, it's out in the field and people are getting access to the drug. There's a long way to go on the part of everyone, but one of the issues that I think cause us to at least feel there's some hope there is that things are starting to move. But what we can't, have and I think Steve and Helene had mentioned that, we can't have a situation where people feel that this is not still an emergency situation. This is still an emergency here, particularly in Asia, and as I mentioned, because of the potential for explosion there, as well as the situation that we already have a relative catastrophe in sub-Saharan Africa. So we've got to get the drugs to sub-Saharan Africa, but we've also got to get it in Asia and the Caribbean and other nations that need it. Prevention is an important part of it. You cannot -- when you talk about access to all, I think you said it very well in the top of the show, is that access to all is very, very important. But we can't forget prevention.

JEFFREY BROWN: Of course you ran, the U.S. ran into criticism in Bangkok over this access question, correct, about the use of generic drugs, about the contributions to the global fund?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Sure. I think there was a lot of misinformation, misunderstanding and a lot of rhetoric going back and forth on the part of activists and others in criticism -- any group is subject to criticism of, when you're dealing with a situation that is so drastically difficult as HIV AIDS. But for example the understanding of what Ambassador Tobias was saying about generic drugs, we, this country and our program would like very much to get those copy drugs bought by the American dollars in the PEPFAR program. What we need to do, and as the ambassador mentioned, we need to have some sort of assurances that these are safe and effective. So we have had now an FDA process where the FDA has

promised to expedite the review of the material that they have so that we can get the money to buy those materials. That was, he wasn't even given a chance to articulate that well in Bangkok, because of the criticism, I mean you saw the TV shots of him trying to articulate that with signs saying he's lying. That was unfortunate. I think if there had been more of a reasonable dialogue back and forth, we would be closer to what the common goal is that all of us want. The United States, other countries, the activists -- there should have been more reasonable dialogue instead of confrontation.

JEFFREY BROWN: Let's just stay -

DR. HELENE GAYLE: I just wanted to add -

JEFFREY BROWN: Yes. Go ahead, Dr. Gayle.

DR. HELENE GAYLE: I just wanted to add on the issue of access, I think it's important to remember that when we're talking about access for all, it's access to all the things that are necessary. That means prevention as well as care and treatment. Yes, we have not made our goals in treatment yet. But I think one of the things that was encouraging about the conference is that there were more practical experiences about how people were getting individuals who needed it on anti-retrovirals. So I think we've made progress and we shouldn't lose sight of that. But it's also important to remember that even if we were to reach our target goals like three million people on anti-retrovirals by the year 2005, we're not going to keep pace unless we are equally vigorous about our attempts to prevent people from getting infected. Almost five million new HIV infections occur every year. We will never keep pace with our treatment goals if we're not equally vigilant about prevention and recognizing that they do go hand in hand. So access for all is really both about prevention as well as care and treatment.

JEFFREY BROWN: Well, Dr. Gayle, tell us more about the prevention side of it, bought because I know this has always been a running question with limited resources, how much goes to the treatment of those already sick, how much goes to prevention for those who are not yet sick. It sounded to me as though in Bangkok there was more emphasis on prevention.

DR. HELENE GAYLE: Well, I think that there was more emphasis on prevention partly because it was in Asia, and clearly for all the reasons that we've all mentioned, there needs to be a high priority on preventing the further spread of HIV in Asia, where the largest percentage of the population lives. So even small increases of HIV in countries like China and India and Indonesia will mean huge numbers of newly infected people with HIV, so prevention has to be a priority. I think the fact that HIV is rapidly spreading and the increased toll that it's taking on women was highlighted, the increased toll that it's taking on youth. So I think it's clear that the prevention goals have to go hand in hand with the treatment goals, and also that we need to continue to expand our options for prevention. We know that the strategies that we already have changing behaviors, treating sexually transmitted diseases, access to condoms, counseling and testing, abstinence, delaying sexuality, all these things we know work, but it's also important that we expand the options. The quest for a safe and effective HIV vaccine has to be a priority. Developing a microbicide, a tool that women could use to protect themselves and put prevention in the hands of women, other tools and new technologies for prevention; this has to be a key priority as well.

JEFFREY BROWN: Okay. Stephen Lewis, come back to the political question that Dr. Fauci was talking about as well, because clearly that was a big event, a big deal in Bangkok. What did you hear what was going on with the criticism, particularly of the Bush administration on this issue?

STEPHEN LEWIS: Well, let me just put it in context. 75 percent of the people in Africa between the ages of 15 and 24 who are infected, almost five million, are young women and girls. Treatment and prevention are inseparable in this dealing with this scourge. And therefore you have to get the treatment going. And with great respect, I can't sort of sit here and accept the faintly disingenuous argument. These drugs we're talking about are drugs that have been pre-qualified by the World Health Organization, using scientists from Europe, Canada, Australia, every bit of scientifically capable as those from the United States. The fact of the matter is that PEPFAR as it now stands will purchase only brand name drugs. We can therefore treat only one-third or one-quarter of the numbers we could treat. And if we're going to stop this carnage, then we have to use the most effective combination that has now been tested and indicated to be utterly safe and effective, as recently as an article as Dr. Fauci knows in the Lancet just a week or two ago. So I really think we should shift the ground towards the global fund and the generic drugs.

JEFFREY BROWN: Okay, let me give Dr. Fauci a response.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: There are multiple ways to do things. And I respect Steve's opinion, but I think we need to put the facts on the table and look at the position that the United States is in. They want very much to get those copy drugs approved. Now, Steve mentioned that the WHO pre-qualified it. Now, with all due respect to the WHO, it's not one scientist against another scientist. That's misleading. I've looked at the clinical data from the Medecins Sans Frontieres, which used the drug, and the clinical data actually looked pretty good. But the point that Ambassador Tobias made is that he is responsible for $15 billion of United States taxpayer money, and I can tell you for sure that if we use taxpayer money to get purchase of a drug that we would not allow to be used in the United States, we would be before 25 congressional committees explaining that, and anybody who knows how things work realizes that that's the case. So it isn't as clear-cut as Steve makes it out.

STEPHEN LEWIS: Dr. Fauci, that's not the argument. The other part of the argument, Jeff, is that more money should be going to the global fund from the United States because that's the multilateral instrument which is most effective. That's why the secretary general of the United Nations Kofi Annan asked that a billion dollars go instead of $200 million annually. This is a vast global pandemic.

JEFFREY BROWN: All right, Mr. Lewis. Thank you very much. We heard much of the debate that was in Bangkok. Thank you all three.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, a California school funding crisis, an ad watch, and a Richard Rodriguez essay.

FOCUS - UNDERFUNDED SCHOOLS

JIM LEHRER: Spencer Michels has our California schools story.

SPENCER MICHELS: The sprawling, diverse West Contra Costa School District snakes along the shores of San Francisco Bay, and stretches up into the hills. Like a lot of districts in California and across the nation, it has been scrambling every way it knows how to remain solvent and improve the education it offers. In June, voters in the district approved a new tax on parcels of land, which cut a $16 million budget shortfall in half.

SPOKESPERSON: Total percentage: 70.7 percent! ( Cheers and applause )

SPENCER MICHELS: Despite the hard- fought victory, community workers knew the parcel tax would only make a dent in the myriad educational problems faced by poor school districts. Still, it was something. For months, students tried to raise the residents' awareness of the plight of the schools.

STUDENT: Hi, I'm a student walking around to help to promote Measure B.

SPOKESPERSON: Yeah?

SPENCER MICHELS: The district had publicized what programs were on the chopping block: All high school sports; all librarians; and all counselors. The announced cutbacks would play havoc with rich and poor schools alike, but the most drastic effects would be felt in the district's poor communities, like Richmond, California, where the schools were already in bad shape. Barbara Becnel runs a center to improve the North Richmond neighborhood and its schools. It's a really high murder rate.

BARBARA BECNEL: There's crime, there's a high rate of asthma, there's a high rate of HIV/AIDS, there's a high rate of substance abuse. So you've got poverty, you have hunger. I would say that you can't fix the schools without also, at the very same time, working on all these levels and layers of issues that impact the community.

SPENCER MICHELS: Even with the occasional tax windfall, schools in places like Richmond never get the attention they need, according to Democrat George Miller, who represents the area in Congress.

REP. GEORGE MILLER: In many instances, these schools are essentially invisible. They're invisible certainly politically. They're poor schools in poor neighborhoods and poor communities, and they don't have the political swak to get the fair allocation of resources.

SPENCER MICHELS: Those problems go beyond the relief brought by a parcel tax. So to push for more money for public schools, several West Contra Costa activists went on a 21-day hunger strike. Among them was 66-year-old Fred Jackson.

FRED JACKSON: Education has been put on the back seat of the agenda, the social agenda.

GROUP: Education!

GROUP: When do we want it?

GROUP: Now!

SPENCER MICHELS: More public funding was also the aim of these students and parents from throughout the district who marched 70 miles to the state capitol this spring. They wanted to convince politicians to guarantee a minimum level of funding for California's public schools.

STUDENT: Everybody deserves an equal education, and we all should be out here fighting for it. There should be tens of thousands of people.

GROUP: Fight for education!

GROUP: Fight for education!

SPENCER MICHELS: Alvin Fields is a junior at Richmond's John F. Kennedy High, which is located in the high-crime neighborhood of Richmond called "the iron triangle."

ALVIN FIELDS: If you want to become somebody in life, you're going to put this aside. If not, then you're going to be with the other statistics on the street selling drugs or stuff like that, and I don't want to become that.

SPENCER MICHELS: Ten years ago, this school was regarded as dangerous and ineffective. It was losing half its teachers each year. Jim Ellis is a former businessman who turned teacher and school administrator.

JIM ELLIS: When I first got here in January 2000, it was typical that you would see students throwing desks around the room. In the hallways, you'd have books or objects being thrown. We had one teacher that was punched in the face.

SPOKESMAN: Make sure we clear the hallway.

SPOKESMAN: Copy.

SPENCER MICHELS: Three years ago, Julio Franco took over as principal at a school that is 45 percent African American, 43 percent Hispanic, and 1 percent Caucasian. When Franco arrived at Kennedy, he raised expectations-- cracking down on student violence, making physical improvements to the school, and inspiring students and teachers to raise the school's academic ratings.

JULIO FRANCO: It boiled down to you get what you expect. And if I'm going to make excuses and say that just because we're low socio-economically, I'm in the wrong position. I'm in the wrong place.

SPENCER MICHELS: Despite Franco's success, Kennedy has remained in jeopardy. Kelly Mosely is one of two counselors at Kennedy who were told this spring they would be laid off.

KELLY MOSELY: Okay, I'm going tell you how to fill this out very briefly, and then we'll go over questions.

SPENCER MICHELS: Although her job was saved by the tax measure, the task she has always faced is daunting. This is a school where parental involvement is limited. The counselors have worked day and night to raise the percentage of seniors going to college, from just 10 percent two years ago to 75 percent this year. But it could easily slip back.

KELLY MOSELY: We have kids here that their parents have just gotten to grade six. They cannot-- as much as they want to-- they can't help these kids get into college because they're lacking the basic, you know, tools that it takes to get them there.

SPOKESPERSON: And I'm going to insert...

SPENCER MICHELS: Besides hoping for tax dollars, JFK took another tact: It started looking for private funds. A wealthy donor gave $2.5 million to build a modern computer lab, which prepares inner-city youngsters for jobs and college. Free food available for students in the lab boosts attendance. The money came from Internet pioneer Ron Whittier and his wife.

RON WHITTIER, Former Intel Executive: This district, in general, is under funded. Something has to happen almost in a quantum fashion to be able to bring additional investment into this district for it to succeed in the long haul. I know no other way than having a bunch of individuals get committed to that task.

SPENCER MICHELS: In the wealthier part of the West Contra Costa District, private money helped fill in the gaps as well. Parents at Kensington Hilltop Elementary School raise $175,000 a year to support art, music, and science.

STUDENT: I was trying to find out if people have internal alarm clocks.

SPENCER MICHELS: Kensington parents volunteer in the classrooms, sometimes in numbers higher than the teachers need. Donations pay the entire salaries of the art and science teachers. But Kensington School is an island. After sixth grade, most kids transfer to private school or to another district, and that strips West Contra Costa of some of its highest achievers. The inequality that exists between rich and poor schools within the district is even more pronounced between rich and poor districts, and that has been an issue in public education for decades, and remains one today. Gloria Johnston is superintendent of West Contra Costa.

GLORIA JOHNSTON: There are neighboring school districts here that get $300 more per student, $600 more per student, $900 more per student than we do. ( Band music playing )

SPENCER MICHELS: And in some districts in the state, the allocation is up to $4,000 more per pupil than in West Contra Costa. Nearly 30 years ago, California's Supreme Court decreed that all public schools, rich and poor, should be funded equally. But outdated state formulas continue to allow wealthier districts to keep property taxes. While schools in poor neighborhoods get some extra money from the federal government, they have to spend more for classes like remedial reading.

SPOKESPERSON: What kind of poem did we say it was?

STUDENT: Shakespearean sonnet?

SPOKESPERSON: Shakespearean sonnet.

SPENCER MICHELS: So, Johnston argues, the discrepancies remain.

GLORIA JOHNSTON: It is not equitable. The funding formula was developed and established in the 1970s, and it has not been looked at in a serious way since then.

SPENCER MICHELS: Congressman Miller says the federal government should withhold education funds from states that don't equalize funding.

REP. GEORGE MILLER: The equalization formulas have to be modernized. The California formula was long before we had this huge disparity in our populations and this incredible diversity in our population.

SPENCER MICHELS: There are no plans on the horizon to even the distribution of school funds. But in addition to the tax increase, the West Contra Costa District scored another victory in June: The state agreed to reduce the interest rate on money it had loaned the district ten years ago. Education advocates say that reduction, plus new public and private funds, merely serve as a band-aids; that schools are hanging on by their thumbs. Without systemic reform of public education financing, they argue, poor districts will have to continue scrambling to maintain the bare minimum in their schools.

FOCUS - CAMPAIGN ADWATCH

JIM LEHRER: Now, media correspondent Terence Smith continues his campaign ad watch, with a look at how swing voters are being targeted.

TERENCE SMITH: A record $200 million has been spent this year on television advertising by the campaigns of President Bush and Sen. John Kerry. A new study of this spending shows the two campaigns are targeting the same 17 to 20 battleground states, but very different demographic groups of voters within them. Joining us is the study's author Ken Goldstein, associate professor of political science and director of the advertising project at the University of Wisconsin. That project is funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts, which also contributes to the NewsHour's media unit. Ken Goldstein, welcome.

This is, I gather, perhaps the most extensive survey you've done or that's been done of presidential campaign spending?

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Yeah. We're real excited to be working with Neilson Monitor Plus, and we're able to cover advertising in all 210 markets in the country.

TERENCE SMITH: And yet as we-- and we have a map that shows this-- they are concentrated, this advertising, in the so-called battleground states. Tell us about that.

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Right. This presidential election is being concentrated on nineteen, twenty battleground states. There's 210 media markets in the United States and we're seeing advertising in only 93 of those media markets, and that translates into only 40 percent of Americans being potentially exposed to television advertising and 60 percent of Americans, those Americans those live in big states like California, Texas and New York, not seeing any political advertising at all.

TERENCE SMITH: And I take it within the battleground states there are some that are more concentrated than others?

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Yeah. The variance in the targeting actually surprised me a little. You have battleground states and then have you the battleground of the battleground states, and those are states like Ohio, Missouri, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Florida, that have the heaviest, heaviest amounts of advertising. And even when you go within those states you actually see some differences in the targeting patterns of the two campaigns. For instance, when the Bush campaign decides to target a state, they go into every media market at virtually the same level within that state, where when the Kerry campaign targets a state, they'll go into media markets at different levels.

TERENCE SMITH: What do you mean by "different levels"?

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Well, the Kerry campaign might put more ads in Cleveland than Dayton, might put more ads in Dayton than Zanesville, or Lima, Ohio. Whereas if the Bush campaign goes into Ohio, they're putting the same amount of points, the same amount of spots aired in just about every single market.

TERENCE SMITH: A fascinating part of this study is the different shows that the two campaigns choose to advertise in. And I wonder whether it's possible, do you think, to divine the strategy of these campaigns through where they place their ads?

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Yeah. That's one of the neat things about studying political advertising, although I'm a little biased about that. It can sort of provide us with a window into the war rooms, into the brains of the campaign strategists of each campaign. And we already talked about how the campaigns might differ a little bit and do their targeting at the market level geographically. But the campaigns also differ somewhat in who they are targeting within the markets; that is, what shows they are choosing to advertise on. Now most campaigns -- or both campaigns are targeting a huge number of resources at local news and news shows and the morning cut-ins on morning news shows. But at the margins, there are differences. So for instance, the Kerry campaign is more likely to put its ads on a show like Judge Judy, which is targeted at women and older women, and where the Bush campaign differ a bit from the Kerry campaign is the Bush campaign is more likely to put ads on shows like Law and Order, NYPD Blue, Jag, shows that tend to target men and younger men.

TERENCE SMITH: Well, explain that. Is it that they are reinforcing what they perceive to be the base, or is it that they're reaching out to groups that may not be in their column?

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Well, I think they're trying to do both with political advertising. And one thing to remember, we said that 40 percent of the country is being potentially exposed to advertising. There might be 5 percent of that 40 percent that's actually undecided. So we're talking about maybe 2, 2.5 percent of the voters in the country are actually persuadable in this race. And so you have a lot of advertising aired at those people. But the other point you brought it is also a correct one. Candidates are certainly going after the undecideds, and we're going to hear a ton about them in swing states, but the campaigns also have a little bit of shoring up to do on their base. George Bush knows he's going to get the support of 90-plus percent of Republicans, but he wants to make sure he maximizes that support and he wants to make sure those potential and likely Republican voters go to the polls and the same thing with the Kerry campaign. And, interestingly, on the Kerry campaign, the Kerry campaign just made a significant buy, over $2 million, targeted at African-American audiences. So it's a sign they're trying to shore up their base there a bit as well.

TERENCE SMITH: There was also another intriguing difference in the study, in that the different campaigns chose different late- night comedy shows to advertise. I mean, explain that. Tell me what they are, and explain it if you can.

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Yeah. The Democrats are more likely to be on Letterman and the Republicans were more likely to be on some of the other late- night shows. Hard for me to explain there, but maybe the Democrats think that they have a hip, young audience that they're more likely voters on something like Letterman.

TERENCE SMITH: And yet across the board, from your study, it seems that both campaigns choose older voters over younger voters, women over men?

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Absolutely

TERENCE SMITH: Right. So there's where they're going with their money, with their campaigning, and with their solicitation of votes.

KEN GOLDSTEIN: It's the conventional wisdom, although I haven't seen any empirical evidence on it from campaign consultants, is that women are more likely to decide late in the campaign and are more likely to be undecided. We also know with tons and tons of geeky political science evidence that older voters are much more likely to vote. So when campaigns have choices to make about how to target their resources, they're more likely to target them at the most likely voters. So even when we see the campaigns both targeting news, but we also see them targeting shows like Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy, and actually Wheel of Fortune is the top- rated non-news show in terms of drawing television advertising, and both of those are shows that are close to prime time, so give a little bit of a different audience than local news, but they're also shows, those game shows that tend to skew a little bit older.

TERENCE SMITH: And so there they go, looking for that again.

KEN GOLDSTEIN: There they go.

TERENCE SMITH: Do the campaigns tailor the ads differently in different markets and in different states?

KEN GOLDSTEIN: When I started studying advertising a couple years ago, I expected that there would be a lot more tailoring of spots from state to state and market to market, and really have not seen that very much in the past and we're not seeing too much of that this year. You don't see a special ad for Arizona, a special ad for West Virginia, a special ad for Ohio. We may see that a little down the line. But in the data I've looked at in the last couple of electoral cycles and the data that we're seeing so far in this electoralcycle, campaigns tend to go in with the same messages and the same mix of messages in markets across the entire country.

TERENCE SMITH: Okay, well, it's only July, and we're $200 million in. Ken Goldstein, thank you very much.

KEN GOLDSTEIN: Thank you.

ESSAY - AMERICAN FAMILY

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, an encore of a Richard Rodriguez essay about gay marriage. It was originally broadcast last March.

GROUP SINGING ON STREET: Freedom is coming, freedom is coming...

RICHARD RODRIGUEZ (March 8, 2004): In the current noisy debate over homosexual marriage, who has bothered to notice that homosexuals are already forming families -- which is the point of marriage -- and that homosexuals are taking their place within the American family?

That term "American family," I grant you, is paradoxical. Americans are notorious failures when it comes to marriage and family. I have always thought our high rate of divorce stems from our individuality -- our lust for the "I" that leads us to romanticize cowboys and to raise children to leave home.

Putting the cart before the horse, American courts have already given lesbians and gays the right to adopt and to raise their own blood children. Now state courts, and soon, no doubt, the Supreme Court, will decide whether gay men and women have the right to say "I do" in the first place.

President Bush has lately announced his support of a constitutional amendment that would restrict the word "marriage" to the union of one man and one woman. Perhaps the states will offer homosexual couples a consolation prize, albeit a term of no sacramental connotation -- civil unions, which is all many people wanted in the first place. But a few weeks ago, I saw them at city hall in San Francisco -- homosexual couples lined up around the block, thousands of them, waiting for a word on a certificate: "Marriage."

They wanted to be recognized by the community as promising fidelity to one another. The mood of those days was like nothing I had ever seen in gay America. What began as a rebellious political gesture had turned earnest. By contrast, in the gay day parades of summer, every sort of eccentricity and irony and nonconformity is accepted in the defiant celebration of one's right to proceed as "I." The energy of the gay political movement of the last 50 years has been driven by the "I," as at the Stonewall riots in 1969 -- my right to define my own privacy.

At the city hall marriages, one was struck by an absence of the gaudy or of camp. There were some wedding dresses, champagne bottles, sure. And there was throughout, a mood of joyful determination to be acknowledged as couples by the civic family. It all had the logic and the simplicity and the shazam of a scene from the "Wizard of Oz"; Mayor Newsom as the wizard somewhere over the rainbow, indeed. A generation ago, thousands, perhaps millions of girls, boys, women, men, came out to their families. It was one of the defining narratives of the '60s, and the narrative continues.

GROUP SINGING IN CHURCH: Holy, holy, holy...

RICHARD RODRIGUEZ: Mothers and fathers who are members of religious communities that fiercely emphasize the bond of family tell me that their church's teaching on the importance of family ultimately makes it impossible for them to reject their own sons and daughters. America already sees gay children within some of our most prominent political families, right and left, regardless of what papa's party says about gays or gay marriage. And regardless of what churchmen may opine, I and, more importantly, my partner have been asked by my family to be godparents to my nieces and nephews many times over.

When I saw the couples at city hall waiting, often with their children, I realized that for pragmatic reasons -- schooling, hospital emergency rooms, medical insurance -- America is going to have to acknowledge the notion of gay unions if only for the sake of the children. But I also saw your uncle there at city hall, your niece, your cousin, your accountant, your clergyman, members of our American family -- he and he; she and she.

People who have internalized a huge burden of loneliness in their lives suddenly stepped forward in the light of day to announce themselves publicly. Each said, "I do," searching in America for "we."

I'm Richard Rodriguez.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major developments of this day: A suicide bomber blew up a fuel truck in Baghdad, killing at least nine people; wounding 60 others.

JIM LEHRER: And 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 eight more.

JIM LEHRER: We'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you, and good night.