The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER:Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight: Our summary of the news; then, the details of today's decision sending the California recall election back to October 7; Iraq Day at the United Nations, with excerpts from speeches by presidents bush and Chirac and secretary-general Annan, and analysis by columnists Jim Hoagland, Trudi Rubin, Dan Sneider, and Andres Oppenheimer; then a report from North Carolina on lost textile industry jobs; and the story of a security dispute at the Capitol Building in Washington.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: The California recall election will go ahead as planned, on October 7. A panel of 11 federal appeals judges issued that unanimous ruling today in San Francisco. It overturns a decision by a three-judge panel to put off the vote. The American Civil Liberties union sought the delay because six California counties still use punch-card ballots. The ACLU said today it would not appeal further.

DOROTHY EHRLICH: With the election just two weeks away we do not believe the uncertainty any longer. At this point it is important that the candidates, the campaigns and the voters know that the election will be held on a date that is certain. Therefore, we have reluctantly decided to accept the 9th circuit's decision and we will not ask the Supreme Court to review the decision.

JIM LEHRER: The California secretary of state will oversee the recall vote. He said today's ruling puts things back on track.

KEVIN SHELLEY: We understand the historical nature of this election. We understand the loss of confidence by the electorate during this past week with the constant back-and-forth, uncertainty given the court deliberations. Now more than anything, it is important we restore confidence in this process. We have two weeks to do that.

JIM LEHRER: Today's ruling left open the possibility of court challenges to the election results. We'll have more on this story in a moment. President Bush defended his Iraq policy at the U.N. today, but there was also sharp criticism. Mr. Bush addressed the U.N. General Assembly. He said the United States was right to lead an invasion of Iraq. And he said returning power to the Iraqis must not be rushed. But French President Chirac called again for a quick hand- over of power. He said it must follow a "realistic timetable." Earlier, U.N. Secretary-General Annan criticized the "preemptive" attack on Iraq. But he also urged world leaders to set aside disputes and help rebuild the country. In Washington, reaction to the president's address split down party lines. Democrats said it fell short, while Republicans said it laid out the U.S. case. They spoke at separate news conferences.

SEN. TOM DASCHLE: I think the president lost an opportunity. He came before international community and he could have made the case for more troops, for more resources. He didn't do that. We are committing 130,000 troops. He has now asked for $87 billion more. I wish he would have made a stronger case, a better case, with more specificity about a plan.

SEN. JOHN WARNER: I feel that the president's message is getting through and that we will find gradually, not instantly but gradually, there will be a foundation laid in the United Nations for additional troops from other countries and hopefully at the conference an expression of financial support.

JIM LEHRER: We'll have excerpts and analysis of the major speeches at the U.N. later in the program. In Iraq today, U.S. forces called in an air strike north of Fallujah, where they've come under repeated attack. Villagers said three Iraqis were killed in a farmhouse, and three more wounded. They accused the Americans of attacking without reason. The coalition military said only one person was killed. And it said Iraqi insurgents had fired first. A raid on militants in Saudi Arabia touched off a running gun battle today. A Saudi statement said police raided a housing compound in a town 600 miles south of Riyadh. It said three militants and one policeman were killed. There were unconfirmed reports the gunmen retreated into a hospital and took hostages. The Saudis cracked down on Islamic militants after suicide bombings in May that killed 26 people. A U.S. Serviceman who worked with Taliban and al-Qaida detainees was charged with spying today. The senior airman had been a translator at the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. A military spokesman said he's accused of espionage and aiding the enemy. Earlier this month, a Muslim chaplain at Guantanamo was arrested for possible security violations.

President Bush's nominee to head the Environmental Protection Agency asked senators to judge him on his record today. Utah Governor Mike Leavitt won praise at his confirmation hearing. But Democrats said he'd be serving an administration with a poor environmental record.

SEN. RON WYDEN: Too many of our country's environmental policies are being cooked by political chefs in the White House kitchen. It seems to me that they brew the science, they season the regulations, and then serve up policies that cater to a lot of the powerful anti-environmental interests.

JIM LEHRER: In response, Leavitt said he'd be a "straightforward voice," and let the president know when he disagrees with him.

GOV. MIKE LEAVITT: He knows I believe based on the nature of our relationship that he will have my best efforts and that he will also have my full and complete opinion, that I won't pull punches with him, that I will tell them directly, sometimes in private, how I feel.

JIM LEHRER: Leavitt is expected to receive a majority endorsement from the committee, but several Democrats have threatened to block the full Senate from voting on the nomination. On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained more than 40 points to close at 9576. The NASDAQ rose 27 points to close at 1901. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to: One last turn in California; Iraq speeches at the U.N., with analysis; lost jobs in North Carolina; and a Washington security dispute.

UPDATE - WHEN TO VOTE

JIM LEHRER: The California recall story. We get more from Dean Murphy, who's covering the story for the "New York Times." Dean Murphy, welcome.

DEAN MURPHY: Thank you for having me.

JIM LEHRER: So it's back to square one more or less?

DEAN MURPHY: Well, it's back to the election on October 7, yeah. There will be no more delays. This seems to be the final legal hurdle. It's removed. Both sides, the Democrats and the Republicans moved forward today like the campaign was on as ever before.

JIM LEHRER: All right. This 11-judge panel, why did they... what did they say about why they reversed their three colleagues who a week ago had stopped the election?

DEAN MURPHY: Well it was a consensus opinion. You had 11 judges, some appointed by Republican presidents, some appointed by Democrats, all coming on the same page. So they essentially had a very narrow view of things. They held that the district court last month did not abuse its discretion in refusing to delay the election. That was the essence of their ruling. The Bush v. Gore issue which had been such an important part of the three judges' ruling last week was dealt in one paragraph in this 12-page opinion. In that paragraph, the opinion gave both sides something to chew on. It said that it was not unreasonable for judges to disagree on such subjects but I it also quoted Bush v. Gore as saying that it was not an equal protection violation just for local counties and states to have different voting systems. So in the end it did not weigh in too heavily on that issue and allowed that the lower court didn't make any mistakes and therefore that was good enough for these judges.

JIM LEHRER: Now these judges, I assume that the three judges from the same court who had a week ago reversed the lower court were not part of this 11, right? These are three others.

DEAN MURPHY: That's right. They were not.

JIM LEHRER: All right. The election now is back to October 7, so bring us up to date politically on what the polls are showing. Now there are two elements to it. First there's the recall of Gray Davis. Then there's the second, if you get rid of Davis, who do you favor to replace him. On the first question, what do polls show and what anecdotal evidence is there about where that stands on just getting rid of Gray Davis?

DEAN MURPHY: Well, the issue of getting rid of Gray Davis has actually worked closer to his favor in recent weeks. The polls show the gap narrowing. He still is losing. No poll has shown him winning in effect of holding off the recall. But the margin is closing rapidly. The question for Gray Davis is whether it can close fast enough and enough by October 7. So he was putting a positive spin on it today saying that he thinks the momentum is his and that he's glad it's going forward. He wants to strike while the iron is hot and that he's going to win. The question is whether or not, in fact, the polls will indicate that that narrows fast enough.

JIM LEHRER: Now then the second element. If, in fact, the voters of California in the first element vote to remove Davis, who replaces him. So where do things stand now in the big... among the big names, Bustamente, the lieutenant governor, and Schwarzenegger and McClintock the two Republicans.

DEAN MURPHY: That got real interesting today. It would have gotten interesting anyway. Now that we know for sure that the election is in two weeks there's a great need especially among the Republicans to get their camp in order. There is a split between the supporters of Arnold Schwarzenegger and the supporters of state Senator Tom McClintock. That split has been in effect for a good month now. If they don't resolve it most people think that the race might go to the lieutenant governor - Cruz Bustamente -- the Democrat. So the Republicans are desperately trying to narrow their field to one. Today there was a bunch of effort to bring people behind Arnold Schwarzenegger. The question again is whether Tom McClintock will drop out. If he doesn't, the conventional wisdom is maybe they cannot beat the Democrats. That would be a big defeat for the recall supporters who essentially wanted to get rid of Gray Davis and certainly did not want to get another Democrat in there in his place.

JIM LEHRER: You're talking about being back to ground zero. That's where they would be, right?

DEAN MURPHY: They would be. Interestingly yesterday Darrell Issa the congressman from San Diego whose money actually allowed the recall to qualify for the ballot, he spent millions of dollars helping to gather signatures. Yesterday he said that if either McClintock or Schwarzenegger doesn't drop out that he might, in fact, encourage people to vote to keep Gray Davis in office. He thinks that Cruz Bustamente who is not as centralist as Governor Davis would be a worse alternative. If the Republicans can't get their acts together in the next two weeks, the man who put all his money behind this effort may actually encourage people to vote for Gray Davis.

JIM LEHRER: Nothing surprises anybody on this thing at this point, does it? Look, what is the conventional wisdom? Is McClintock or Schwarzenegger, are either one of them likely to do this, to go willingly and quietly?

DEAN MURPHY: No. That is definitely not expected. Tomorrow is sort of an important date in all of this. Tomorrow night will be the first debate in which all the candidates, including Arnold Schwarzenegger and McClintock, all the top candidates, are going to sit on the same stage and debate one another. Up until now someone has been missing from all of them primarily Arnold Schwarzenegger. So it will be really important to see how the two Republicans do tomorrow and see if either of them get some momentum at this debate that could knock the other one out. Conventional wisdom is that Arnold Schwarzenegger is going nowhere. He has the money; he has the support of the mainstream part of the party. He is the pragmatist behind them. There's a group of pragmatists in the Republican Party who want to have the governorship. They want it badly. They think Arnold Schwarzenegger is their key to get it. Although he may not be a true believer, as they say, on a lot of Republican litmus test issues, they think he can win. Tom McClintock is a conservative Republican. A lot of people think he can't ultimately win. The question is whether or not the purists are able to hold out or the pragmatists win.

JIM LEHRER: And so McClintock is the one who is catching the real pressure, right?

DEAN MURPHY: He is, although he's a real dogged guy. He is the guy who has been around for decades in politics in California. He's consistent. He's sort of the steady Eddie of the group. He has up until now insisted he will not back out. The question is in the end he decides it's in the best interest of Republicans for him to back out. But even if he does his name stays on the ballot. There's a lot of conjecture that his true loyalist supporters will vote for him anyway. A lot of people -- 600,000 people have already voted by absentee ballot. There could be a whole lot of McClintock voters already in there.

JIM LEHRER: We can look at the bright side. Whatever happens will happen on October 7.

DEAN MURPHY: That's right.

JIM LEHRER: Thank you very much, Dean Murphy.

DEAN MURPHY: Thank you.

FOCUS - FIGHTING THE PEACE

JIM LEHRER: Now on to the United Nations and Iraq. President Bush and other leaders laid out their visions for Iraq before the U.N. General assembly today. Ray Suarez begins our coverage.

RAY SUAREZ: Today's meeting of the United Nations General Assembly proved to be a canvas illustrating many of the tensions building in the chamber since the United States opted to go to war in Iraq without explicit U.N. Approval. It fell to Secretary-General Kofi Annan to attempt to bridge the gaps that remain among some of the world's leaders, defending the U.N.'s role, while implicitly criticizing U.S. actions.

KOFI ANNAN: Since this organization was founded, states have generally sought to deal with threats to the peace through containment and deterrence, by a system based on collective security and the United Nations charter. Article 51 of the charter prescribes that all states, if attacked, retain the inherent right of self-defense. But until now, it has been understood that when states go beyond that and decide to use force to deal with broader threats to international peace and security, they need the unique legitimacy provided by the United Nations. Now, some say this understanding is no longer tenable since an armed attack with weapons of mass destruction could be launched at any time without warning or by a clandestine group. Rather than wait for that to happen, they argue states have the right and obligation to use force preemptively, even on the territory of other states and even while the weapon systems that might be used to attack them are still being developed. According to this argument, states are not obliged to wait until there is agreement in the Security Council. Instead they reserve the right to act unilaterally or in ad hoc coalitions. This logic represents a fundamental challenge to the principles on which, however imperfectly, world peace and stability have rested for the last 58 years. My concern is that if it were to be adopted, it would set precedents that resulted in a proliferation of the unilateral and lawless use of force with or without justification. But it is not enough to denounce unilateralism unless we also face up squarely to the concerns that make some states feel uniquely vulnerable, since it is those concerns that drive them to take unilateral action. We must show that those concerns can and will be addressed effectively through collective action.

RAY SUAREZ: Without responding directly to the secretary- general's criticism, President Bush defended U.S. actions in Iraq as part of a necessary war against terror.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: All governments that support terror are complicit in a war against civilization. No government should ignore the threat of terror, because to look the other way gives terrorists the chance to regroup, and recruit, and prepare. And all nations that fight terror as if the lives of their own people depend on it will earn the favorable judgment of history. The regime of Saddam Hussein cultivated ties to terror while it built weapons of mass destruction. It used those weapons in acts of mass murder, and refused to account for them when confronted by the world. The Security Council was right to be alarmed. The Security Council was right to demand that Iraq destroy its illegal weapons and prove that it had done so. The Security Council was right to vow serious consequences if Iraq refused to comply. And because there were consequences, because a coalition of nations acted to defend the peace and the credibility of the United Nations, Iraq is free, and today we are joined by representatives of a liberated country. Across Iraq, life is being improved by liberty. Across the Middle East, people are safer because an unstable aggressor has been removed from power. Across the world, nations are more secure because an ally of terror has fallen. Our actions in Afghanistan and Iraq were supported by many governments, and America is grateful to each one. I also recognize that some of the sovereign nations of this assembly disagreed with our actions. Yet there was, and there remains, unity among us on the fundamental principles and objectives of the United Nations.

RAY SUAREZ: But French President Jacques Chirac chose tough language to make his case that the U.S.-Led war in Iraq did irreparable damage to the world body.

PRESIDENT JACQUES CHIRAC ( Translated ): The United Nations has just weathered one of its most serious trials in its history. Respect for the charter, the use of force, were at the heart of the debate. The war, which was started without the authorization of the Security Council, has shaken the multilateral system. Having taken stock of this crisis, our organization is now resuming its onward march, for it is primarily within this forum, the crucible of international law, that we must exercise our responsibilities to the world and to future generations. In an open world, no one can live in isolation; no one can act in the name of everyone; no one can accept the anarchy of a society without rules. There is no alternative to the United Nations. But in order to meet today's challenges, this fundamental choice, expressed by the charter, requires a far-reaching reform of our organization. Multilateralism is crucial because it ensures the participation by all in managing the affairs of the world. It guarantees the legitimacy and democracy, in particular, when it is a question of deciding on the use of force or of laying down universal norms.

RAY SUAREZ: The French president also said a reconstruction will only succeed if power is transferred to the Iraqi people quickly.

PRESIDENT JACQUES CHIRAC ( Translated ): In Iraq, the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqis, who must have sole responsibility for their destiny, is essential for stability and reconstruction. It is up to the United Nations to lend its legitimacy to that process. It is also up to the United Nations to assist with the gradual transfer of administrative and economic responsibilities to the Iraqi institutions according to a realistic timetable, and to help the Iraqis draft a constitution and to hold general elections.

RAY SUAREZ: President Bush left the chamber before President Chirac spoke, but the two met later privately. The French president told reporters afterwards there were many areas of French-U.S. agreement, and he did not want to see differences over the post war Iraq political transition blown up.

JIM LEHRER: Now some analysis of today's U.N. Iraq developments, and to Gwen Ifill.

GWEN IFILL: And so we take a look behind the words and opinions offered by those three world leaders today with four leading foreign affairs columnists for American newspapers: Jim Hoagland of the "Washington Post," Trudy Rubin of the "Philadelphia Inquirer," Andres Oppenheimer of the "Miami Herald," and Dan Sneider of the "San Jose Mercury News."

So, Jim Hoagland, what were those three men today, Kofi Annan, Jacques Chirac and President Bush, attempting to do? What were they trying to do today?

JIM HOAGLAND: Well, surprisingly enough, I think all three were trying to reach some common ground, some common points. But they were all operating -- all three of them were operating within their own system and within their own experiences and political needs. Kofi Annan's speech I think was the most interesting of the three. He was critical of President Bush's doctrine of preemption but he didn't dismiss it. He pointed out that all of the world has to have the same concerns that the United States does about terrorism, all countries rich and poor are affected by terrorism. And so he called for a new dialogue, a new opportunity to shape a real reflection about terrorism and about the use of force in a situation about... where there are early means of authorization of sanctions against terrorism to contain terrorism rather than going along with the existing system.

President Bush, of course, offered a very vigorous defense of his decision on Iraq but at the same time he talked in terms of at the timetable to turn over power to the Iraqis, he hailed the fact that the United Nations had seated the Iraqi delegation and tried to find some common ground also with President Chirac who talked about a realistic timetable. President Chirac was the most pointed of the three, the most political of the three, addressing very much his domestic audience and refusing for a moment to admit a mistake. But at the same time he reached out toward the United Nations and to some extent toward the United States.

GWEN IFILL: Trudy Rubin, when President Bush went to the General Assembly last year, he was basically saying that the U.N. was on the verge of irrelevance if it didn't support U.S. action in Iraq. It was a different tone today, wasn't there?

TRUDY RUBIN: I think there was, but I'm not sure that the way he delivered his message will get that point across to U.N. members. One ofthe most interesting things I thought was that the president didn't mention Iran or North Korea, but he did talk about the need for new U.N. Resolution to deal with non-proliferation. What this indicated to me is that he understands you can't do a pre-emptive strike against every rogue nation. And he is looking for a way to do a diplomatic containment or prevention of those countries getting nuclear weapons. But what is worrisome is that there is such a fear of preemption, there's such a nervousness about the Bush approach that I'm not sure he can get the cooperation he needs to go to the United Nations for that. So I sensed in his talk a recognition that the U.N. could be useful, but I'm not sure that his overall approach and his overall tone, no apologies, no court or preemption is right, is going to get the reaction from U.N. members that he needs, and I also think that this conflict with Chirac overshadows the real need for change within the United Nations and maybe undercuts it as well as undercutting the possibility for a useful U.N. role in Iraq.

GWEN IFILL: Dan Sneider in addition to talking about preemption as Trudy Rubin just alluded to, the president also cast his justification for U.S. action in Iraq in the way he has been lately casting to the American people. That's talking about the war against terror and characterizing Saddam Hussein as an ally of terror. Did you pick up on that? Did that seem significant to you?

DAN SNEIDER: Well it seemed significant in the sense that the president framed his entire discussion for the United Nations as a response to the events of 9/11. And I think that in part was an argument he was making maybe not so much to the people in that room but to the American people for whom the questions of the justifications to this war are arising again. I have my own questions about stating, as the president did, that Iraq is the central front now in the war on terror. There's no question that we're facing tremendous resistance and some of it of a terrorist nature but I wonder if the central front might not be located still perhaps in Afghanistan on the borders between Afghanistan and Pakistan where we're still pursuing the al-Qaida leadership and the al-Qaida organization. I think that there are many people out there in the world as well as the United States who share... who don't share the president's characterization of Iraq as being now the focus of the war on terror.

GWEN IFILL: Andres Oppenheimer, what do you think about that characterization?

ANDRES OPPENHEIMER: Yeah, I think it's pretty accurate. What I saw happening today is three people talking past each other. It's pretty much of a repetition of what we've been seeing over the past year. If you look at what foreign newspapers are saying, most of them are centering on the U.N. Reform, on the issue of whether or not the U.S. should act unilaterally, et cetera, et cetera -- pretty much the issues that Kofi Annan talked about today and yet President Bush talked about a totally different issue. I agree he was talking to a domestic audience. He was sort of saying we did the right thing, we had to react, we had to act unilaterally but he did not address the two issues that most of the world was interested in: One U.N. reform, which means the U.N. Security Council, the people who make these decisions are still the same five who were running the world 50 years ago. The world has changed... the U.N. has changed from 51 members to 199 members, 191. We're still having the same system as we had 50 years ago. The second issue which Kofi Annan articulated today is whether or not the U.S. should act unilaterally. Bush did not address any of them.

GWEN IFILL: So Jim Hoagland, do you agree? Were they all talking past each other and not actually get to go the heart of the questions before the United Nations right now?

JIM HOAGLAND: I think they talked past each other on the big issues that Andres has just referred to but I think it's important to note that President Bush in his speech did call for an expanded U.N. role. He specifically said that the United Nations can be very helpful in developing a constitution, in training civil servants, and in....

GWEN IFILL: Is that the role the U.N. has been asking for or is that just a small concession on the United States' part?

JIM HOAGLAND: I think this is the role that the United Nations can constructively play. I think it's very unrealistic to think that you're going to have a large number of foreign troops, certainly you're not going to have U.N. blue helmets. Kofi Annan has made that very clear that the United Nations is not capable of taking on a huge security challenge that Iraq represents. So I think the president was fairly realistic in outlining tasks that the United Nations can constructively accomplish and would be wise to do so. One of the things that we have to note also is that Kofi Annan is under a lot of pressure in his own system from his own people to essentially cut and run and get out of Iraq, not to have the United Nations cooperate with the coalition, the occupation forces there. So far he's resisting. I think his speech today... the architecture of his speech today was an elegant balance of trying to stay involved at the same time while pointing out very serious problems that the occupation has developed.

GWEN IFILL: Trudy Rubin, let's pick up on that. Kofi Annan said today that the U.N. is at a fork in the road. If it is at a fork in the road and you have two strong Security Council members like the United Nations and France who seem to be not seeing eye to eye to put it mildly, what happens to that fork? Does everyone just stay frozen in place?

TRUDY RUBIN: I think that's a real danger. And I think that because the two positions of the U.S. and France are so different that it might prevent the U.N. from being able to do what it can usefully do. U.N. reform is a big issue. Kofi Annan and previous U.N. leaders have been trying to get reform of the Security Council for a decade now. It's unlikely to happen because those countries that have the veto including France are unlikely to be willing to make the concessions necessary -- for example, having one EU seat instead of more than one European seat. But there are things that the U.N. can do. And one of the things I found interesting about today is that the U.S. seems to be opposing one particular thing because Chirac advocates it even though it might be useful. And that's a transfer of sovereignty, a symbolic transfer of sovereignty to Iraqis fairly soon even though elections could be held much later than Chirac is calling for, which is an unrealistic time frame next spring. Now the Iraqi governing council itself is asking for that transfer of sovereignty which would help legitimize it at home and would give a longer breathing space for institutions to be developed but because Chirac is asking for it and because he's talking about the U.N. being involved in the transfer, it seems that Bush is automatically opposing it. I'm afraid that kind of game playing may undercut things that the U.N. can usefully do.

GWEN IFILL: Dan Sneider, does it sound as if there is some game playing going on to you especially on this timetable of handing over power or sovereignty?

DAN SNEIDER: Well, I'm at a loss to understand why it is we can't do what Trudy just suggested, that is, state clearly a timetable for the transfer of sovereignty and begin to shift authority to the Iraqi governing council at this point. I think if you look outside of the United States-- and I recently have been to two countries, India and South Korea that are considering large numbers of troops to Iraq-- that is really the crucial question for them. That is, that they do not want to lend themselves to a situation in which the United States appears to be, to the Iraqi people and to the rest of the world, an occupier. I think the transfer of sovereignty and of authority is the crucial measure that allows them perhaps to make the decision to really provide significant support to the American effort in Iraq. I think if we don't do that, then we can't expect to get that kind of support. We're going to bear the burden of this situation in Iraq largely on our own.

GWEN IFILL: Andres Oppenheimer, I think it was Trudy who mentioned earlier that we never heard the names of the countries, North Korea or Iran today, even though the president did allude to rogue nations with access to weapons of mass destruction. Do we think there is something significant in his failure to mention either of those countries by name?

ANDRES OPPENHEIMER: No, I think he did it because he wanted to emphasize the good things and he wanted to dispel any fears by the people sitting in that room that the U.S. would do another action like Iraq. All in all, he emphasized the positive. He talked about, you know, all the good things the U.S. is doing. He said we are against slavery. He said we are against sexual tyranny. He said we are doing all kinds of good things for the kids in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was largely as Jim and Dan and Trudy said -- a speech for domestic consumption. I talked to two or three ambassadors who were sitting in that room who said it wasn't a bad speech. He didn't say anything outrageous but it was disappointing, both of them said, because it didn't address the key issues most of the world is interested in which is whether or not the U.S. will give, you know, extend an olive branch to its adversaries and start again the road to a multilateral relationship with them and whether he will do something for U.N. reform. These countries feel very strongly. You will see tomorrow in their headlines that the U.N. is outdated, that the U.S. and Britain and France have too much power and the emerging powers like India, like Brazil, like Mexico have too little power. That's the big issue much more than Iraq in many of these countries.

GWEN IFILL: You know, coming back to where we started, Jim Hoagland, and Andres just mentioned it, both Chirac and Annan talked about multilateralism and the role... the importance that the United Nations keep that alive. It's something the president maybe paid attention to only in a glancing way. Is that significant?

JIM HOAGLAND: I think you have to judge it as significant. I think it was a good speech. Certainly by the standards most presidential addresses to the United Nations, it was a good speech. It doesn't match President Bush's speech last year which was so dramatic and so well thought out. Here I think he dealt with his own case very well. But he did miss the opportunities to engage Kofi Annan's idea about finding a way to accommodate America's concerns about terrorism and America's enormous power in the system within the international community. He missed that opportunity and perhaps a couple of others as well.

GWEN IFILL: Jim Hoagland, Trudy Rubin, Andres Oppenheimer, and Dan Sneider, thank you all very much.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight: Bad times for textile workers, and a Capitol security debate.

FOCUS - TEXTILE BLUES

JIM LEHRER: Disappearing jobs in the textile industry. Betty Ann Bowser reports from North Carolina.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: At 8:00 in the morning, Janet Patterson would normally be heading out for work. But recently, she lost her job.

JANET PATTERSON: Okay, you all go where you're all supposed to go.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: So she now spends that time walking her grandchildren to school.

JANET PATTERSON: Adrian?

ADRIAN: I don't know...

JANET PATTERSON: You don't know where your class is?

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Paterson had a good job at Pillowtex, a textile mill in Kannapolis, North Carolina, where she hemmed sheets for 38 years.

JANET PATTERSON: I started five days after I turned 18. I was the first black hemmer in the sheet department, and I made good money, even to the point I used to make enough money, they had to pay me in two checks.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Patterson was able to support herself and five of the grandchildren she's raising. But in July, after several years of losing money, Pillowtex finally declared bankruptcy, putting Patterson and nearly 5,000 other textile employees in Kannapolis out of work. That's one-sixth of the entire population in this town of 30,000. Since 1994, 138,000 jobs have been lost in the textile industry in North Carolina alone. Recently, more than 18,000 textile jobs have been lost nationwide. Many of the people who have lost their jobs are older workers like Patterson, who didn't finish high school.

JANET PATTERSON: It's like they took everything from us. And going to try and fill out applications, the only thing you can put on there is "Pillowtex, 38 years." And at my age, they aren't hiring unless you are young or you got experience in some other trade. And I haven't experienced any other job outside of, you know, Pillowtex. It hurts.

SPOKESPERSON: How are you?

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Just days after the shutdown, workers lined up at this church, just blocks from where they used to make sheets and towels, to hear their options for the future.

SPOKESMAN: We're setting up appointments right now that will start on Wednesday.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Thirteen different state and local agencies have laid out extensive programs to help the laid-off workers get health insurance, new job training, and, assistance with unemployment insurance. But many of the Pillowtex workers have more immediate problems.

SPOKESMAN: He'll take them.

SPOKESMAN: Thank you.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: So community organizations have come to their rescue.

SPOKESMAN: Give me two more composition books.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Some didn't have enough money to buy school supplies for their children.

SPOKESPERSON: Just help yourself, and...

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Others needed clothing or food.

SPOKESPERSON: That is the last one. $800-something dollars we got to pay in tax.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: And some, like Delores and Robert Gambrell, couldn't pay their bills, including their property taxes and the next month's mortgage.

DELORES GAMBRELL: Don't have the money for it. And even if I went back to work tomorrow, I'm so far behind now, till... I don't see any way out but probably bankrupt and... and hopefully I can bankrupt and hold onto my house. I doubt it. I probably don't owe but five orsix more years on my house. And now I can't even get somebody to talk to me about refinancing it, because I don't have a job.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Another big worry is health insurance.

SPOKESPERSON: Have you gone to your doctor?

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Bernetha Brown is head of the local Union of Needle Trades, Industrial, and Textile Employees, also known as UNITE.

BERNETHA BROWN, UNITE: There are a lot of people that are going to have to reschedule their surgery. There were a lot of people on medication who actually cannot afford to buy the medication. There is just one story after the other.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: What can you do for them?

BERNETHA BROWN: You know... you know, to actually be direct of what we can do, I... you know, I don't know. We are actually just trying to find ways as we go along.

SPOKESPERSON: Go downstairs.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Mainly, Brown is directing them to these help centers, where, to qualify for some programs, there are mountains of paperwork, and often confusion about where to get help, as Patterson found out when they informed her that because she lives in a different county, she cannot get assistance at that crisis center.

JANET PATTERSON: I called this number and asked to set up an appointment.

SPOKESMAN: Right.

JANET PATTERSON: That hurt my feelings.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Pillowtex was once Cannon Mills, one of the country's leading brands for sheets, towels, and pillowcases.

COMMERCIAL: Cannon touches your life.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: It was founded in 1906 by James William Cannon, who not only built the mills, but a main street and a town. He even built houses for the workers to live in. In those days, when you were old enough, you went to work at the mills, just like your parents and grandparents did. As the company grew, so did Kannapolis, and over time the two became economically and culturally intertwined. The interconnection is so strong that when word spread of the Pillowtex shutdown, the whole community came to help. Residents came together for a prayer service for the laid-off workers, and raised over $7,000 in just one night for their aid programs.

SPOKESPERSON: Thank you very much.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Congressman Robin Hayes has strong family ties to the mills. He is the grandson of Charles Cannon, who ran the company for over 50 years. He says it's been a painful experience to watch the demise of an industry that was so much a part of his family, and he says longstanding flawed federal government trade policy is at fault.

REP. ROBIN HAYES: Instead of increasing markets, they created massive incentives for American companies to cut costs by going overseas and using cheap labor. We have taken our white-collar jobs... we are in the process of destroying our middle class to create a middle class in other countries. It shouldn't be done; doesn't have to be done.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: This is what Congressman Hayes is talking about: American companies moving their operations to third world counties like Bangladesh, where they can pay workers 80 cents a day to do the same jobs they would have to pay an American worker $100 a day. The trend started in the 1970s, when American companies, facing higher labor costs at home, were lured overseas. Textile companies claimed the cheaper labor would keep prices lower for consumers.

In the last ten years, global trade has increased significantly. Both the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994 and the formation of the World Trade Organization in 1995 have gradually removed trade- protectionist barriers and encouraged free trade. In fact, advocates of free trade say that these two events have dramatically increased the economic growth of both developing countries and industrialized nations.

SPOKESPERSON: Let's welcome Mark Vitner. (Applause)

BETTY ANN BOWSER: But economist Mark Vitner says there has been a negative human effect to opening up these global markets.

MARK VITNER, Economist: We have 130,000 folks working in the textile industry today, down from 350,000 in 1972. We figure that we're going to lose 100,000 of those jobs by the end of the decade. So we're going to... we're going to be going through this on a continual basis over the next ten years. And it's hard enough to make this adjustment for the 5,000 workers that just lost their job. We've got 100,000 more that are going to follow them in the next ten years.

SPOKESMAN: How long have you been here?

BETTY ANN BOWSER: North Carolina Governor Mike Easley says his state is taking the biggest hit, as textile workers are losing their jobs faster than he is able to bring in new employers. He says the administration's trade policy is moving too fast.

GOV. MIKE EASLEY: We've been very specific in what we've asked the administration to do. First, slow down; don't give away so many jobs so rapidly. Take for instance the Vietnam agreement. I wish we would rescind that. That allows the equivalent of 164 million shirts, 84 million pairs of pants into the country immediately. It increases by 7 percent every year. We're having to find 7 percent more jobs every year in order just to keep up with that one.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: The United States Trade Representative's Office declined our request for an on- camera interview for this story, but insisted that the recent trade agreement with Vietnam protects the textile industry from foreign competition by imposing strict quotas on textiles from that country. A senior trade official also said that textiles and apparel are the most protected industries in the United States, with the highest tariffs and quotas in place. While thousands of laid-off workers line up out side the old plant for meetings with the state about unemployment and medical benefits, the governor and the union leaders say they are still hoping someone will come in and buy the mills. But so far, none have come forward.

FINALLY - CAPITOL IMPROVEMENT

JIM LEHRER: And finally tonight, Kwame Holman reports on another Washington debate over the cost of security.

KWAME HOLMAN: The grounds of the United States Capitol often are swelled with the activity of tourists, lobbyists, and members of Congress. But recently, most of the commotion has been caused by the booming sounds of construction. The action is on the east front lawn of the Capitol Building, within these ten-foot walls. This is the site of the new Capitol Visitors Center, a state-of-the-art underground welcome center for the two million tourists who come here each year. Where once there was a plaza, trees, and fountains, today there is a five-acre-wide, 70- foot-deep hole in the ground-- the beginnings of the largest expansion of the Capitol since it was built 203 years ago. Those with official business in the Capitol must navigate around concrete barriers to enter, while most tourists are routed to a temporary entry point on the west front.

MAN: I think it's wonderful, and whatever little, minor inconveniences there are, which are not many, are well worth it.

KWAME HOLMAN: The purpose of the visitors center is to make touring the Capitol a more pleasurable experience. But equally important, officials say, it will give Capitol police bettercontrol over the flow of visitors. Security improvements were demanded five years ago after a lone gunman got inside the building and killed two police officers. Alan Hantman is the man in charge of the massive project. He was appointed architect of the Capitol in 1997.

ALAN HANTMAN: With a dozen entrances into the Capitol, it's very difficult for the police to know who's coming, where a threat may be coming from. So with 90-95 percent of the people coming into the building coming through a remote screening facility over here, treated with respect, and welcomed into the visitors center, it will allow the police at the other doors to know that these are members, these are members of the staff, these are folks coming on business, and much better be able to really control the level of security for the Capitol Building and for people coming into the visitors center itself.

KWAME HOLMAN: The visitors center, sunk three stories below street level, will house a massive gathering place for visitors called the great hall, a 600- seat cafeteria, two theaters that will feature historical films about the Capitol, and a 400-seat auditorium for use by tour groups, as well as members of Congress. Above ground, the view will be of a tree-lined pedestrian plaza. Skylights from the center below will be built into the plaza, giving an expected 7,000 daily visitors inside the center a unique view of the Capitol dome. But architect Hantman acknowledges construction has not gone according to plan. An unusually wet spring this year, and reliance on inaccurate underground maps, led to construction delays, adding to costs that already were rising. In 1999, Congress budgeted $265 million for the visitors center. Today's price tag: $373 million. Also contributing to the increase were security upgrades mandated after the September 11 attacks, totaling $38 million; and a late decision to add office space for members at a cost of $70 million. Construction of the Capitol visitors center was supported broadly among members. But like many issues before Congress, there is a battle over funding. Some appropriators, the members in charge of spending the money and paying the bills, are balking at the rising costs. Republican Jack Kingston chairs the house appropriations subcommittee that oversees the Capitol visitors center project. At a hearing in July, Kingston told Capitol architect Hantman it was time to consider scaling back the visitors center to save money.

REP. JACK KINGSTON: The other thing I would like to see is a list of potential cutoff points of tangible bricks and mortar that we can cut out of this project so that we can tell members we've searched our soul, we've searched the plans, and we've searched the designs, and we've come up with some things.

SPOKESMAN: No, that's... I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman.

KWAME HOLMAN: Postponing work on certain parts of the project, Hantman says, is a decision that belongs to Congress. Kingston agrees, and suggests one possibility is to strike plans to build a $10 million tunnel that would connect the Capitol to the Library of Congress, a thousand feet away.

REP. JACK KINGSTON: I've been a member of congress for ten years. I have observed most members of Congress almost never go to the Library of Congress. If they do, it's once a year. And you know what? I'll give them an umbrella. I don't think a tunnel is necessary. What we want to do is see some things cut out, the way you would do it if you were adding on to your house. You cut out a bathroom, you come up with some cost reductions. Gee, whiz, it's done every day in the United States of America in the private sector. We too, in Congress, can do things like this.

KWAME HOLMAN: But fellow House Republican John Mica, a member of the Capitol Preservation Commission and a former private developer, said doing anything less than completing the visitors center as planned would be a mistake.

REP. JOHN MICA: I think when you do a project of this magnitude, you don't want to do it on a half-baked basis. You don't want to say, "oh, we should have put a tunnel into here. Oh, we should have opened this up there." So I think it is being done very wisely. Most of the costs... added costs can be justified.

KWAME HOLMAN: Mica was an original sponsor of legislation to build the visitors center. He said the rising costs have been due to factors beyond both Congress's and the architects' control.

REP. JOHN MICA: First of all, we had the shooting of two police officers. The second thing that drove the cost up are the effects of September 11. Both have added considerable costs and design changes to the project.

KWAME HOLMAN: However, Congressman Kingston says the security issue has become overused as an excuse to spend more money.

REP. JACK KINGSTON: It is really odd to me that nobody thought about security when this was built. You know, Washington has backed into... anything we can put the name of security on means "I'm going to spend more money." Bring up 9/11; it's synonymous with "I'm over-budget."

KWAME HOLMAN: But just last week, over Kingston's objections, the House joined the Senate in approving an additional $48 million for security upgrades. Despite the rising costs and periodic delays, the visitors center still is on schedule to open in December 2005.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major developments of this day: A federal appeals court ruled the California recall election will go ahead as planned on October 7. At the United Nations, President Bush said returning political power to the Iraqis must not be rushed. But French President Chirac called again for a quick hand- over of power.

JIM LEHRER: And again to our honor roll of American service personnel killed in Iraq. Here, in silence, are four more.

JIM LEHRER: We'll see you online, and again here tomorrow evening, with the U.S. Administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, among others. I'm Jim Lehrer thank you and good night.