The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

Intro

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. Leading the news this Friday, the suspect in the Athens TWA bombing said she was not involved. Unemployment was down in March but not as much as expected. Treasury Secretary Baker said President Reagan still opposes an oil import tax. And former White House aide Michael Deaver denied all wrongdoing in his dealings with the White House. We'll have the details in our news summary coming up. Robin?

ROBERT MacNEIL: After the news summary, we have Jim Lehrer's exclusive and extended interview with Michael Deaver. Then, should oil prices be left to free market forces? Two oilmen, Mesa's T. Boone Pickens and Apache's Raymond Plank, debate. Finally, we talk to one of the great actors of our time, Alec Guinness. News Summary

LEHRER: Former White House aide Michael Deaver said today he had done nothing illegal, wrong or inappropriate. Deaver was responding to charges he misused his status as a former top Reagan assistant to further his career as a lobbyist. He said in a NewsHour interview his efforts on behalf of corporate and foreign clients were proper, and that included his discussing the B-1 bomber with White House budget chief James Miller on behalf of Rockwell International. Deaver said he maintains his close personal relationship with President and Mrs. Reagan, but does not trade on it.

MICHAEL DEAVER, former White House aide: There's no question that Ronald and Nancy Reagan are very dear friends of mine and have been for almost 25 years. What I'm saying is, (a), I wouldn't tread on that friendship on behalf of a client, and frankly I'm insulted if people think that's all I have to offer.

LEHRER: We will have the full interview with Michael Deaver right after this news summary. Robin?

MacNEIL: The woman terrorist suspected of planting the bomb that killed four Americans on a TWA plane has reportedly denied any involvement. A statement in the name of May Elias Mansur was issued in Tripoli, Lebanon, denying that she planted the explosive and threatening to sue everyone who accused her. Egyptian authorities said Ms. Mansur traveled from Cairo to Athens in the seat where the bomb exploded some hours later on the return leg from Rome to Athens. A senior Greek security officer, Nikos Kikonakus, said today that she waited in the transit lounge and took a flight to Beirut shortly before the crippled TWA plane landed at Athens. But the mystery deepened today when Egypt's deputy minister of tourism, Bahi Nas, said that Ms. Mansur had been specially searched before getting on the plane in Cairo. Because she checked in late, she underwent a full luggage check and a body search. The Christian Voice of Lebanon radio station said today that Ms. Mansur is a Lebanese Christian married to a Druse and that she's a member of the Revolutionary Brigades terrorist group. The radio said she's about 30 and divides her time between Moslem West Beirut and the Brigades' training camp in the Syrian-controlled Bekaa Valley. In Washington, State Department spokesman Bernard Kalb said that security at Cairo Airport had official U.S. approval as recently as last month.

BERNARD KALB, State Department spokesman: The FAA, that is to say, the Federal Aviation Administration, in accordance with U.S. requirements, makes periodic checks of security conditions at foreign airports served by U.S. carriers. The objective is to ascertain whether these airports meet the security standards of the International Civil Aviation Organization. Now, the most recent review that took place was last month, and at that time the FAA found that Cairo airport met the security standards of the ICAO.

MacNEIL: Also in Beirut today, a statement purporting to be from two other terrorist groups claimed they had caused the crash of a Mexican plane four days ago in which 166 people died. The typewritten statement, left outside news offices, was signed by the Arab Revolutionary Brigades and the Egyptian Revolutionaries. With it was the picture of a man described as a suicide martyr.

LEHRER: On the economic and oil front today, the nation's unemployment rate went down in March 0.1 to a 7.2 rate. The Labor Department figures were a disappointment to economists and others in the administration and elsewhere who expected it to drop much more than that. On oil, Treasury Secretary Baker all but closed the door to President Reagan supporting an oil import tax. Baker said on NBC's Today Show, "The free market system must be allowed to work on oil prices, even if their dramatic fall continues to damage the U.S. oil industry." And on Wall Street, low oil prices were given as one reason the stock market closed this week down more than 80 points. It was the largest weekly drop in market history. The Dow Jones average closed today down more than 27 points, at 1739.22. Analysts said oil prices and low interest rates prompted investors to sell stocks.

MacNEIL: The United Nations agreed to give Israel access to the secret files of former Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim. Waldheim has been at the center of a growing controversy over charges that he was part of a World War II Nazi unit that committed war crimes. Waldheim today interrupted his campaign for the presidency of Austria to hold his first open news conference on the subject. He said that charges collapsed like a house of cards. In a recent interview, Waldheim vigorously denied he took any part in the crimes against the Yugoslav partisans.

KURT WALDHEIM, former U.N. Secretary-General: I deeply regret the way this war took place. But I want to state clearly that, first, I wasn't involved in this cruel warfare, and secondly, that casualties were on both sides.

MacNEIL: Waldheim also said he had nothing to fear if documents in the U.N. war crimes archives were released. These files have been opened only three times in the past, when governments requested files on war criminals Adolf Eichmann, Klaus Barbie and Joseph Mengele.

That's tonight's news summary. Coming up, our exclusive interview with Michael Deaver, a debate over oil prices by two oilmen, and a conversation with actor Alec Guinness. Michael Deaver: Improper Conduct?

LEHRER: Michael Deaver is first up tonight. Michael Deaver, of course, is the close friend of President and Mrs. Reagan who left his position as deputy White House chief of staff last May to become an instant and spectacular success in Washington public relations. He opened an office in Georgetown and signed up important U.S. corporate clients like CBS, TWA and Rockwell International; foreign nation clients like Canada, Mexico, Singapore, South Korea and Saudi Arabia. His quick success was reported in the national press; he even made the cover of Time magazine three weeks ago. But all of the notices were not favorable. There were allegations he was improperly selling his access to his high-level government friends, President and Mrs. Reagan included. There was a specific complaint about his involvement on behalf of Canada in an acid rain decision, and just this week the report of his having gone to see White House budget director James Miller on behalf of the B-1 bomber and Rockwell International. This set off a storm of stories and criticism which culminated today with New York Times columnist William Safire's call for a special counsel to investigate. This afternoon I taped a newsmaker interview with Mr. Deaver, his first since the real storm broke.

Mr. Deaver, welcome.

MICHAEL DEAVER: Thank you.

LEHRER: What about William Safire's suggestion that it is time for a special counsel to investigate your activities? What do you think of that?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, I'm not a lawyer, but I'm not sure the special counsel law applies to private citizens. I'm no longer in the government, and I think that's a law that applies only to government officials. But if it didn't, I haven't done anything that would require a special prosecutor that I know of. But I'll just have to wait and see what happens. I'll cooperate with any government agency, as I have at any time.

LEHRER: The headline -- did you read Safire's column? The headline over it said that -- the headline said, "Reagan's Billy Carter." What do you think of that suggestion?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, I'm not making beer. I don't know what the connection is.

LEHRER: Well, the specifics -- let's go through some of the specifics that he mentioned and have been mentioned by others. The one this week, you went to see James Miller, head of the Office of Management and Budget, on behalf of Rockwell International, correct?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, I went to see Jim Miller because I hadn't seen him since he'd taken over the Office of Management and Budget, and I wanted to let him know what I was doing on behalf of various clients. I went to the meeting purely on an informational basis. I didn't ask him for any action or an opinion. And I was clearly within the legal guidelines to be able to do such a meeting. I'm very careful, because I knew when I left the White House that I would be the target of interest for a lot of people, both in the media and outside the media. So I hired me a very fine law firm here in Washington, D.C., and I said I want to do everything within the law. And I never make an appointment with anybody connected anywhere near the White House without checking first with my own counsel to be sure that it's appropriate, which I did in this case.

LEHRER: And the counsel told you what?

Mr. DEAVER: That it was perfectly appropriate to meet with Mr. Miller.

LEHRER: They told you it was legal or they told you it was appropriate?

Mr. DEAVER: They told me it was not illegal.

LEHRER: And you thought it was appropriate?

Mr. DEAVER: Sure.

LEHRER: Did you talk to him about the B-1 bomber and Rockwell International's interest in making more of them?

Mr. DEAVER: I talked to him about the B-1; I talked to him about various projects that I'm working on right now. Once again, I did that to let him know where I was coming from and perhaps give him some information he hadn't been able to get from other sources.

LEHRER: Well, now, the Rockwell -- or the B-1 decision is basically a military hardware decision. How come you chose to go to Mr. Miller rather than, say, to Secretary Weinberger or somebody at the Pentagon?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, first of all, I'm not the only consultant that Rockwell has or that other defense contractors have. So many times that work is kind of singled out for whoever may be working on a particular agency. I knew Jim Miller; I thought I could talk to him and give him some facts about it, and that's what I did.

LEHRER: And you see absolutely nothing wrong with your having done that?

Mr. DEAVER: I wouldn't have done it had I thought there was something wrong with it.

LEHRER: No, I mean -- obviously before; I'm talking about now.

Mr. DEAVER: No. No.

LEHRER: Later after all the questions.

Mr. DEAVER: If you read all the news accounts, with the exception of Mr. Safire, who basically has an opinion about me and has had for a number of years -- this isn't the first article that he's ever written about me -- if you read the news media account that are written without a bias, you'll never see anything in any of those accounts that anybody says I did anything wrong. The counsel from OMB, the White House, all the people that have been questioned about it don't think that this was an inappropriate meeting.

LEHRER: Well, some have suggested --

Mr. DEAVER: Some anonymously have suggested, that's right.

LEHRER: -- that this was, to use your word, inappropriate even though it was technically legal, that just as a matter of practice, that it might have been questionable. What do you say to that?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, everybody is entitled to their opinion, and there are plenty of people in this town who have as a hobby, an interest, giving opinions, albeit off the record or on background, about me and everybody else they can think of. So I can't spend my life or my business worrying about what some anonymous person's going to be quoted about in the newspaper.

LEHRER: Okay, let's move to the --

Mr. DEAVER: Let me just make a point on this.

LEHRER: Sure, right.

Mr. DEAVER: All this business about access; if I had the kind of access that's being reported that I have, why would I ever waste my time with a guy like Jim Miller? Why didn't I pick up the phone and call the President of the United States, say, "Buy some more B-1 bombers"? I mean, that's what people are saying of the kind of access I have. I don't have that kind of access. I've never done that, nor would I ever do it.

LEHRER: What about those who would say that Northrop Corporation, which makes the Stealth bomber, which is in a form of competition with the B-1 bomber, doesn't even have the access you have to go see Jim Miller?

Mr. DEAVER: I don't believe that.

LEHRER: Do you think Jim Miller would see a paid representative of the Northrop Corporation?

Mr. DEAVER: I would assume he would, sure. If the person made his presentation correctly and went about setting up the appointment in the right way, I'm sure Jim Miller would.

LEHRER: You're not suggesting, are you, Mr. Deaver, that you do not have special access by virtue of your connections at the White House, your friendship with President and Mrs. Reagan, and your years of association with the Reagan administration and the Reagans even before?

Mr. DEAVER: There's no question that Ronald and Nancy Reagan are very dear friends of mine, and have been for almost 25 years. What I'm saying is, (a), I wouldn't tread on that friendship on behalf of a client, and frankly I'm insulted if people think that's all I have to offer. I was in this business before I got to the White House; I considered myself to be a professional. I like to think of myself as someone who can strategize for people who have problems and help them walk through the process of this government maze. That's what I like to do; that's what I think I'm being paid to do. It's not being able to pick up the phone and get into the White House.

LEHRER: Are you concerned at all about the possibility that when you call, say, a Jim Miller, and you say, "This is Mike Deaver and I want to come see you," that he may be seeing you because you have a close relationship with his boss, the President of the United States?

Mr. DEAVER: No, because I really -- when I would call anybody in the government, I would give them a pretty good reason for my meeting. It wouldn't be just, "Jim, can I see you on next Tuesday?" I would say, "Jim, I want to come in and talk to you about some of these issues that we've discussed in the meeting." So he has a perfectly good out there to say, "Gee, I don't think that's appropriate" or "Gee, I really think you ought to talk to the guy that works for me that deals with those issues." I would give anybody an opportunity to very politely and understandably not meet with me if they didn't want to, or send me someplace else if you have to meet with anybody. One of the things that I think is misleading about all of this is that, sure, Jim Miller's an important guy and he makes a lot of decisions, as does the secretary of agriculture and the secretary of the interior. But frankly, my experience has been that the guy you want to see is not that guy in the long run, and it would be the guy at the third and fourth level that's making those decisions that go up to the Jim Millers of the world. Those are really more important people to talk to.

LEHRER: Let's talk about the Canada incident for a moment. This -- you represent the government of Canada.

Mr. DEAVER: Yes.

LEHRER: And the President changed his mind on an acid rain decision. And when Prime Minister Mulroney was here, the President announced that he would endorse a commission to take a look at the acid rain problem. Were you involved in President Reagan's changing his mind?

Mr. DEAVER: No. I've never talked to anybody in the administration about acid rain since I left. I attended two meetings in the White House where the subject of acid rain was discussed, and that was in my role of coordinating every summit the President had while I was there. I don't think to this day I could tell you what acid rain is. I was looking at it from the standpoint of the politics between our two leaders so that they would have a successful summit, so all you guys would be able to write something positive for a change, and I really didn't get into the substance of acid rain when I was in the White House. And as I said before, I've never talked to anybody in the administration since I left about acid rain.

LEHRER: For the record, you did not discuss this with President Reagan, this recent -- the recent decision?

Mr. DEAVER: No. No.

LEHRER: Did you suggest that he read, say, a magazine article or a newspaper article that might --

Mr. DEAVER: I've never discussed the subject with Ronald Reagan.

LEHRER: What, then, did the Canadian government want you to do for them?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, acid rain is one issue that the Canadians are interested in. There's a myriad of communications and other efforts that they're interested in, in this country, and I advise them on that. And I can advise them on how to deal with this government on issues like that. But acid rain is only one of many things that I work on for the Canadians.

LEHRER: But the end result -- I don't mean to be picky here -- but the end result of what President Reagan did is exactly what the Canadian government wanted you to help them get done, correct?

Mr. DEAVER: Yes, but I didn't, frankly, have anything to do with it. I'm sorry to say -- it would be nice to be able to say to the client, "I got that changed for you," but I didn't. And frankly, that is selling short the efforts of their ambassador here in town or a lot of the people in the prime minister's office in Canada who worked very hard on this, hammering out these details with the people in the NSC and the State Department.

LEHRER: Why do foreign governments like Canada, Saudi Arabia and the others buy your services?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, once again, I hope they buy my services because I offer them something somebody else can't give them, and that is a pretty good track record of being able to solve problems, in developing strategies, in helping clients determine what their objectives are and coordinating those efforts for them here in this town.

LEHRER: What does that mean, Mr. Deaver? What specifically do you do for them?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, first of all, I'm not going to talk about specifically what I do for clients, but if a client came to me and they had a particular problem, say, in the trade area, that this government was looking at their government for some kind of differences that they had on trade. We have a very fine experienced staff in my office that has worked for a good many years in the trade area. They would sit down, look at the problem, say here's the way to go about it, here's the people you ought to be talking about, here's the very minimum you can do to be able to resolve this problem, and get a quick resolution of it. Governments aren't any different than corporations or individuals, who take one look at Washington, D.C., and shake their head and don't understand how the process works, how to get through the myriads of the bureaucracy and the decision making. And we kind of take them by the hand and show them the path.

LEHRER: The layman might look at this and say, "Hey, now, wait a minute. What do we have government officials for? What do we have ambassadors for? Why do we have secretaries of energy, secretaries of defense to make all -- why do we need middle people like Mike Deaver to do the bidding of a federal -- of a foreign government with our own U.S. government?"

Mr. DEAVER: Well, it's not any different, as I said before, with a foreign government or with a corporation or an individual. Sure, there are lots of people in government, but they've all got 10,000 things that are more important in their mind than what my particular client's interested in. And somebody has to knock on their door and explain as intelligently as possible the position of the client, so that that at least can be part of the mix that is in the decision that's ultimately made. This didn't start with Mike Deaver; this started a long time ago, and frankly I think that the system has improved over the years. I think that in many instances, not only myself but others who are working in the advocacy field, assist the United States government as much as they assist their client. I mean, I have clients who have been negotiating problems with a particular government agency for three years. They weren't able to get through; they didn't know who to talk to, and they were spending a lot of money, as was the U.S. government on the other side of the table. And we were able to go in and say, "Look, you're talking to the wrong people, you're going at it in the wrong way. Here's the way you can resolve this." The U.S. government was delighted that somebody finally grabbed these people by the hand and said, "Here's the way to do it."

LEHRER: There have been several reports that you are negotiating to sell your company, Michael K. Deaver & Associates, for $18 million to a British outfit -- is that right?

Mr. DEAVER: I have had several firms that have been interested in my firm, and yes, I am in the process of discussions with such-and-such in London. But those discussions are ongoing, and I haven't signed a paper or resolved anything yet.

LEHRER: The obvious question is, what after less than a year makes Michael K. Deaver & Associates worth $18 million? Here again, just a simple layperson's question.

Mr. DEAVER: Well, I think you have to ask the people that are interested in buying.

LEHRER: Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's you, right? I mean, it's Michael K. Deaver?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, it may be me. But I --

LEHRER: Is there anything else other than you in the company?

Mr. DEAVER: Oh, sure. I've got 11 people, and I've got some very good experienced people who have worked around this government for a good number of years, and I can't take all the credit.

LEHRER: But I noticed the Saudi Arabia account that you just -- the contract you've just signed, the Saudis said specifically that only Mike Deaver works on our account or we cancel. Is that true of most of your clients?

Mr. DEAVER: Some. Some.

LEHRER: So if you sell out --

Mr. DEAVER: No, no, no, no. I'm selling the assets of the company. I still will -- if I sign this particular arrangement, would have total control over the management of MKD & Associates. I still have the right to hire and fire and set the direction and deal with the clients. I'm not selling any of that, nor would I.

LEHRER: I see. I see. There's been much made about the fact that when you left the White House, President Reagan let you keep your White House pass. Do you still have it and use it on a regular basis?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, I still have it and I use it when I go to the White House. But I'm not the only one that's no longer in the White House that has a White House pass.

LEHRER: Well, the suggestion is that you are the only one.

Mr. DEAVER: Well, there are a lot of suggestions that are baloney, too. I'm not the only one. There's probably close to a half a dozen people who used to work in the White House who have been given that privilege by the President, which he has the right to do.

LEHRER: Does it concern you at all that a person who represents, say, a client like Rockwell International, which is trying to get B-1 bombers sold, has a White House pass, can go into the White House at will dealing with the executive branch of government?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, first of all, under the regulations I can't go into the White House and deal for my clients, and don't. I use the White House -- frankly I've use the White House pass to go to meetings that the White House has asked me to come to, to help them strategize some things, or to go and have a private conversation with my friends, the Reagans, which is totally social.

LEHRER: So you don't see anything wrong with that and you don't plan to do anything about that?

Mr. DEAVER: I wouldn't have taken it had I felt there was something wrong with it.

LEHRER: Sure. In fact, do you plan to change anything as a result of all of these questions and all these stories of the last few days, last few weeks?

Mr. DEAVER: No, can't think of anything. I mean, I wonder what people thought I was going to do when I left the White House -- be a brain surgeon? That was my business; that was the business I went back to.

LEHRER: None of this has given you pause?

Mr. DEAVER: No.

LEHRER: Did you read Richard Cohen, columnist of The Washington Post, who criticized you yesterday? He made this point, that President Reagan came to Washington, got elected, in fact, President and came to Washington criticizing Washington and Washington's way of doing things. The insiders in Washington, you know, who deal in interest, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. And his allegation is that you, one of the Reagan confidantes, have become the ultimate Washington insider. Is he right or is he wrong? What's your thought about that?

Mr. DEAVER: Well, I enjoy Washington; we have our home here, we love it. It's a fascinating city. I enjoy the various things we do here. I don't know that I'm a Washington insider. I don't think Ronald Reagan has changed, though. I think he is still battling for those things that he's talked about for 35 years. He was in Sacramento for eight years too, and I don't think he was delighted with everything he left there. And I think Mr. Cohen's wrong.

LEHRER: What Cohen meant was that you're dealing -- I mean, the business that you are in, in representing various interests, both corporate interests and foreign interests, you are dealing, as he said, in influence and that sort of thing, the very thing that Ronald Reagan has always been opposed to.

Mr. DEAVER: Well, I don't -- I -- frankly, it's hard for me to follow that, because I -- Reagan campaigned against a faceless bureaucracy and the power of the bureaucracy. I don't remember him ever talking about advocates or people that were involved in the business of influencing legislation or administrative decisions.

LEHRER: Finally, Mr. Deaver, and I'll leave you alone, do you feel that this whole episode involving you these last few weeks -- since you left the White House, but the way that it has intensified -- is unfair? Do you feel that these questions -- or do you feel these questions are legitimate, should be raised and should be answered?

Mr. DEAVER: Sure. I think some of them are legitimate questions. This kind of thing kind of goes with the turf. You don't get your picture on the cover of Time magazine without people taking shots at you. I understand that. I've been in the business for a number of years to be able to understand that. The only thing I would hope, that people would be accurate. People in even asking the questions make an assumption that isn't necessarily true. I've always said that the media, particularly in this town, is a lot like a bunch of starlings on a telephone line. One of them flies off and they all go off together, without checking anything. And the old days of two sources and being sure that you got the information from the horse's mouth directly unfortunately are gone. And that wouldbe the only criticism I would have of the media as a whole: they ought to be more careful and they ought to work a little harder.

LEHRER: Okay. Mr. Deaver, thank you very much.

Mr. DEAVER: You bet.

MacNEIL: Still to come on the NewsHour, two oilmen debate the falling oil prices, and we talk to British actor Alec Guinness. Oil Prices: Free or Fixed?

MacNEIL: As oil companies continue to announce losses and layoffs, the initial euphoria over lower oil prices is giving way to concern over the survival of the domestic industry. Judy Woodruff has more on the story. Judy?

JUDY WOODRUFF: A sign of just how bad the domestic oil situation has grown came with today's unemployment statistics. While overall last month thousands of new jobs were created, in the oil and gas industries almost 25,000 jobs were lost. The drop in oil prices has also set off a disagreement within the Reagan administration over just what should be done to help U.S. oil producers. On Tuesday, Vice President Bush said that he intended to plead with Saudi Arabian officials when he meets with them this weekend to stabilize their prices. He said a continued free fall in prices would be bad for the U.S. Treasury Secretary James Baker, however, said today that the administration would not be trying to pressure the Saudis to fix price levels. In fact, he said, the lower prices go the better it is for the U.S. economy overall. Baker also rejected the idea of higher taxes or fees on imported oil. We look at both sides of the argument now with two oil executives. T. Boone Pickens is the chairman of Mesa Petroleum Company of Amarillo, Texas. He joins us from Los Angeles. And Raymond Plank is chairman of the Apache Corporation, an oil and gas exploration company in Minneapolis, where he is tonight.

Mr. Plank, I want to begin with you. Just how bad do you believe the domestic oil situation is in this country right now?

RAYMOND PLANK: Well, it's very serious presently. Prior to the end of 1985 the industry had lost about a third of the independent producers and companies from the period 1981, when prices peaked. But in the -- and we were left at that time with around 16,000 to 18,000 companies. At the present time, with the price having fallen in two for the oil as a commodity, forecasts by some of our associations in the industry suggest that if current prices were to continue to the end of the year, we would lose half of the remaining number of companies and probably more than 50 of the jobs that remain, at least in the exploration and development sides. So that's a serious question as to whether we in fact are able to perform in a manner that is of assistance to the public interest when we are losing half our revenues.

WOODRUFF: In the short run, what do you think ought to be done about it?

Mr. PLANK: In the short run I think it's very useful to have a public debate in terms of whether or not the public interest is being served by the prices that we all prefer at the gas pumps falling. And in the long run I believe -- in the long run in this industry, which has now got a question confronting it of survival, I would think that we ought to have a variable tax on oil imported into this country, which would have the effect, for example, if we wanted to have a survival price, a survival of exploration of, say, $20 a barrel, and the selling price today is $12, that the United States Treasury would pocket the difference of $8 per barrel, and then the industry could perhaps continue to employ people and perhaps invest additional funds with some assurance that long-term decisions, which really require four or five years' lead time in our enterprise, in our industry, could be made with confidence. I happen to believe that the latter course would be preferable.

WOODRUFF: So you're talking about a fairly sizable import tax. Mr. Pickens, first of all, do you agree with Mr. Plank's assessment of the situation?

T. BOONE PICKENS, Jr.: Well, I come from the free market side, and I'm in agreement with -- more with the administration that we should just let the free market decide in this situation. I'm not for an import tariff.

WOODRUFF: Well, but you don't deny that the situation is as serious as Mr. Plank described it, do you?

Mr. PICKENS: Not at all. If you go back, the best barometer we have in the industry to look at the health of the industry is the rig count. And if you go back to the high-water mark that we had in the third week of December 1981, we had 4,531 rigs operating. Today we have 1,024 rigs operating. So we're operating one fourth of the number of rigs in the United States that we did in 1981. Well, I couldn't agree more that the jobs that have been lost could have been anticipated by the rig-count drop. So the industry is in -- is desperate. But also I am aware of the fact that out of the 50 states in the United States, 10 of them are producing states and 40 of them are nonproducing states. And I think it's academic as to where you might stand on the issue, that realistically there's no way that there's going to be a tariff put on imported crude oil and a support to the domestic oil and gas industry.

WOODRUFF: You're saying politically you don't think that'll happen.

Mr. PICKENS: I don't think there's one chance in 500.

WOODRUFF: But do you believe that nothing should be done, that the situation should just go as it is -- am I hearing you correctly?

Mr. PICKENS: Well, I have to go back to my opening remark. I'm a free market person, and I believe that, you know, that we have to go with the hand that we're dealt. And right now that's the hand that we're dealt. Now, personally -- and I'm on record saying that I think we've got one-in-three chances we'll be back up to $18 to $20 a barrel in July, and that we'll be back -- three chances out of four we'll be back to $20 a barrel by October the first. It's unrealistic for me to believe that the OPEC nations by cutting production two million barrels a day would -- they can raise the price to $20 a barrel. If they keep it to 18 million barrels a day instead of 16 million, they're going to get $10 a barrel for it.

WOODRUFF: All right, Mr. Plank, let me come back to you. He's saying the price is going to come back up in a few months; nothing to worry about, let the free market forces work their will.

Mr. PLANK: I would hope that the prices might come back, but I question whether it's in the public interest or national interest to leave the pricing structure upon which survival of a very important segment of the United States of America is dependent up to the whims of the leaders of the sovereign states who make the determination as to the price at which they are prepared to sell oil. We currently are competing with foreign oil at $12 a barrel and we have no control within the United States, nor an energy policy which has as yet determined what it's in our national interest that we should produce at. In turn, we're not investable as an industry in a way that should enable us to develop other sources of fuel in the longer term which would replace the domestic reserves when we run out.

WOODRUFF: Mr. Pickens, do you agree that we are leaving it up to the whims of the foreign oil producers?

Mr. PICKENS: Well, there's no doubt about it, that OPEC has set the price of crude oil since, you know, in the '70s when we first had the embargo of '73 and the gasoline lines of '79. But we have a bigger problem for the independent producers in the United States than the price of oil set by OPEC, and that's the price of gas set by the transmission companies in the United States, also curtailments that the independents are experiencing. So, you know, there are more -- I mean, the independents are being victimized from more than one direction. So it's -- you know, I still believe that if we'll give it some time -- if you think back in 1979 when we had the gasoline lines and everybody panicked, well, we know now as we reflect back on that period, had we let gasoline prices go up at the time, well, the lines would have gotten shorter. We would have walked more and ridden a few bicycles and parked the car a little bit more. So -- and the price would have come back to where it was a competitive free market level. So I think it's the same way here as far as crude oil's concerned.

WOODRUFF: Mr. Plank, you want to respond?

Mr. PLANK: Well, to one aspect of his comments I think I would like to respond. I'm also concerned about natural gas, but I would note that natural gas is competing with oil in the marketplace today, and so when oil is now driven down by those who are controlling our prices here in the United States, natural gas prices are falling too. And if we do knock out our domestic production industry, then the housewives doing the cooking and heating their houses largely dependent upon natural gas are going to find that we in the industry are going to be so weakened or we will be out of business to the point where we will not be able to supply the gas that is required for our domestic purposes. I believe that --

WOODRUFF: Let me stop you just there. I want to get back to the oil question for a minute and ask Mr. Pickens, do you think that Vice President Bush should be pressuring the Saudis while he's over there this weekend to do something about oil prices?

Mr. PICKENS: I'm sorry, I didn't get the question.

WOODRUFF: Vice President Bush, as you know, is in Saudi Arabia this weekend talking to them about the oil situation, we've been told. What do you think he should be saying to them? Should he be urging them to do what they can to bring prices down, to hold off on their production?

Mr. PICKENS: To bring prices down or --

WOODRUFF: I'm sorry. Bring prices up and lower production. I misspoke.

Mr. PICKENS: Oh, you know, I think that Vice President Bush can visit with the Saudis about whatever he wants to. And it's my feeling you have 13 countries in OPEC, and no doubt about it, the Saudis are the swing country in that group. But I believe that what you're going to have happen here is the price is going to go back up, and the reason it'll go back up is because the 13 OPEC nations will get back together again.

WOODRUFF: How far down do you think it'll go before it goes back up again?

Mr. PICKENS: Well, it's coming back up right now. I mean, as far as I'm concerned, I was totally in conflict with the commentary 15 minutes ago that the Dow averages were going down because oil prices were going down. The Dow averages are going down because oil prices have been coming back up. And we bottomed out about three days ago, I feel, and the price is back up about $2 a barrel on the New York Merc. So I think that what the New York Merc's telling you today, that the price of oil is coming back up, because the OPEC nations will get back together again. It's interesting if we just go back just a few years when we were all so upset by the fact that 13 countries had gone together to form a cartel, and now all at once we want those 13 countries to go back together and form a cartel again so they'll raise the price of oil. So it's -- you know, if people would just relax and let some things happen here, I think we'd be satisfied with the results.

WOODRUFF: Mr. Plank, a comment from you about what the Vice President ought to be saying to the Saudis, if anything?

Mr. PLANK: Well, I would hope that the Vice President might have said most of what he was going to say to the Saudis prior to going there. I would hope that he would have talked that through with Mr. Baker and Mr. Reagan. In the absence of having done so, apparently, and in the apparent schism, at least as it is reported, I wouldn't think it would be wise between the Vice President and the President, given the relative nature of power, for him to say much of anything. So I really don't have much of an opinion. I would have preferred that the Vice President previously had said, "Mr. Reagan, would we want to let McDonnell-Douglas in the United States and the Boeing Aircraft Corporation fail in order that we then have the opportunity to buy our defense weapons from the Russians?"

WOODRUFF: Mr. Plank, we thank you for being with us; Mr. Pickens, thank you. Thank you both, gentlemen.

Mr. PLANK: Thank you, Judy. Alec Guinness: Man of Many Parts

MacNEIL: Finally tonight, a conversation with actor Sir Alec Guinness, who celebrated his 72nd birthday this week. For the past 50 years Guinness has delighted audiences with an amazing array of character roles. His autobiography, titled Blessings in Disguise, has recently been published by Alfred Knopf. Guinness began and continues his career on the London stage, but in America he's most famous for his performances in films.

[voice-over] One of the earliest to receive widespread attention was the 1949 dark comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets. In it he played all eight members of an aristocratic family, all of whom are murdered by a vengeful relative.

[clip from "Kind Hearts and Coronets"]

MacNEIL [voice-over]: Kind Hearts was followed by other comedies: The Lavender Hill Mob, The Man in the White Suit and The Lady Killers. In 1957 he won an Academy Award for his portrayal of an intrepid army colonel in David Lean's World War II story The Bridge on the River Kwai.

[clip from "Bridge on the River Kwai"]

MacNEIL [voice-over]: Several years later he would play King Faisal in another Lean epic, Lawrence of Arabia. Guinness became a familiar face to a much younger generation of moviegoers when he played the grandfatherly wizard Obi Ben Canobi in George Lucas' Star Wars. One critic, writing about Guinness' performance as the world-weary spymaster George Smiley in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy said that he can say more with a slight pursing of his lips than most actors can communicate while shouting from the rafters.

[clip from "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy"]

MacNEIL: Sir Alec, in your book you say in the introduction, talking about yourself in the third person, "Deep in his heart he hankers to be an artist of some sort, but he is only an actor." Why "only"?

Sir ALEC GUINNESS: Well, I mean, an actor's kind of a journeyman, isn't he? He's not a composer, he's not the playwright, he's not the painter. I mean, he's an interpreter of other people's words. I mean, like a violinist. Maybe he can be a good violinist or a lousy violinist, but he's playing other people's notes. I mean, I think it must be so of marvelous to travel the world, you know, with your typewriter or your pen or your paintbox and your canvases, and know that you are self-contained in your observation of other people, the world, what's around you. But an actor has to have -- you can't act on your own. I mean, of course we do in the bath, but you can't. You've got to be with someone else, or even if you're a one-man show you've got to have other people to watch you, otherwise you're mad.

MacNEIL: Are you able to recognize and describe for yourself what it is that makes your acting different from your great contemporaries, the Gielguds and the Oliviers and the Richardsons?

Sir ALEC: I don't know. I suppose when I was a young actor, I mean, I was very much under the influence of Gielgud, who gave me my first sort of proper work in the theater. I think my attitudes were probably a bit more avant garde than his. He's 10 years older than I am, and maybe I had a great longing to pare things down, to be very economical. I can't think there's a great deal of difference now, however, in their talents, because I think we've all got into an economic stage of -- in every branch of life, of liking the simple line -- the clear, straight line.

MacNEIL: Was it deliberately getting rid of style? Is that what you were --

Sir ALEC: Yes, but then that creates its own style. Whatever you do is going to create -- I mean, if it's going to have any style at all, it's going to create its own method. I think I've carried fining things down too far. I'm now prepared to now be a bit more extravagant if need be.

MacNEIL: How is that going to show itself?

Sir ALEC: Well, I don't know. It's always the next part I'm going to put things right in.

MacNEIL: I see. In thinking your way into a character, is there a moment when something clicks and you just suddenly say I've got how I'm going to attack that, I've got that?

Sir ALEC: Yes, I think so. But probably a whole series of little clicks. I'm about to play in a film of Little Dorrit, and I really couldn't -- I'd never read the book before. I've tried. I mean, I quite like Dickens, could never get on with it -- 50 pages, I would put it down, think, no, I can't be bothered. And I tried twice last year to read it, failed each time. Then the script came, was good, and so I thought I must read the book properly, but I don't understand the character at all; I simply can't grasp it. Then I decided that the book was one of the finest he'd ever written. Well, that was a help. You know, I've suddenly got hooked by the book. I still didn't understand the character until I came across a line in it which didn't really belong to that character, but the line amused me so much that it somehow, I think, I hope, will enable me to use it as a springboard for other lines which hadn't meant anything to me. The line, which I could apply to myself indeed, is of a man speaking of his elderly brother -- I mean, quite an age -- "He's no longer very elastic." And I suddenly thought, I'm certainly no longer very elastic, and it became a kind of linchpin for me for a whole lot of other lines, and therefore something of the character. I hope.

MacNEIL: Can we discuss a couple of characters you've played in recent years that the American people know very well? George Smiley. Do you remember what was it that gave you the clue to understanding that character?

Sir ALEC: Well, the books were there, John Le Carre's books, which I liked very much. And of course I talked a lot to him. And when you get down to it, I mean, I didn't realize when I said I would love to play Smiley and they kindly let me do so, but it hadn't dawned on me until I started to work on it that here was a huge problem. Because here was a man endlessly interviewing people who must not give away to that person who he's interviewing -- I mean, he's trying to tease the truth out of them -- what he's actually thinking. And so if he thinks that is not true what they've just said, you can't give it on the face. And the audience, of course, is wanting to know what he's thinking, and you cannot do it. So this was a tremendous problem, which made a sort of blank. All one could have hoped to be was to look vaguely intelligent, leave it at that.

MacNEIL: In your book, you write about the circumstances of your birth. What you don't discuss is whether you think it had any relevance, not exactly knowing who you were by being born, you presume, illegitimately, not knowing quite who you were -- whether that has any relevance to your career, to the line of work you've taken up and the way you, as it were, lose yourself in different characters. Have you thought about that?

Sir ALEC: Yes, sure. I think there's something, maybe, that seeking an identity in a few dozen other characters. I don't mean deeply psychologically, but I can recognize that. I can recognize that it's maybe not such a bad thing for an actor to be illegitimate, and to have this area of grayness tucked away somewhere to build on. Lovely to have a nice solid family, of course, but it's not a troubling thing for an actor, I don't think. It makes you feel part of a fairly -- what used to be a fairly scummy profession, I think, and a lot of sawdust on the floor, which I think most actors are always hoping to get back to and ceasing to be ladies and gentlemen.

MacNEIL: Has your great professional success answered your own sort of private questions about identity?

Sir ALEC: Well, I suppose most of us spend our lives trying to find out who we are, or, you know, as one gets older you want to feel you're a real person. I think a great deal of my life, I wouldn't know how to put years to it or anything, has been to convince myself that I am a real person and not a piece of tinsel cut out by some playwright, you know, to glitter away on the stage.

MacNEIL: You describe an extraordinary experience with James Dean. Would you tell me that story?

Sir ALEC: It's perfectly simple. It was the first time I'd ever been to Hollywood. It was God knows how many years ago. Little Italian place. Went there and they said, "Sorry, full up." And I walked away and then I heard sneakers pounding along, turned around; it was James Dean, whom I -- I knew who it was, but I'd never met in my life. And he said, "If you're looking for a table, won't you come and join me?" which we gratefully accepted. Going back into the restaurant, he said, "May I show you something I've just got?" And there in the courtyard of this little restaurant was this car, all done up in cellophane, with red roses or red carnations, can't remember, tied to the bonnet. And he said, "It's just been delivered to me." And I said, "How fast can you go in that?" And he said, "Oh, I can do 140, 150 or something." And it wasn't my voice; it was -- I'm sure these strange things happen when you are desperately tired, which I was, and hungry. And I said -- you know, I looked at my watch and I said it's 10:30, whatever it is at night, "I beg you not to get into that car because if you do you will be dead by this time next Thursday, next week." And he said, "Oh, shucks, don't be so -- ," and I was ashamed of myself because it wasn't like me speaking. I'm really rather reticent and not inclined -- so we went, we had a very perfectly pleasant dinner, and he was killed in that car exactly a week later. That's all there was to it. It was an odd, funny thing I can't account for. It was as if it was like a last warning to him. And he was a man I didn't know, even.

MacNEIL: What do you want still to do that you haven't done?

Sir ALEC: Oh, it's the next job, that's all. I'm not interested in the past jobs or what I've done. It's always the next job, whether it's in theater or film, may be my answer to my own failures or indeed, you know, cap a success in some way. The next time I always kid myself is going to be a really good piece of work, it isn't the past.

LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Friday. Former White House aide Michael Deaver said on the NewsHour he has not misused his ties with the Reagan administration to help clients of his lobbying firm. And the suspect in the Athens TWA bombing said she was not involved.

Good night, Robin.

MacNEIL: Good night, Jim. That's our NewsHour. Have a nice weekend. We'll be back on Monday night. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.