The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight four Chinese-Americans react to President Clinton's trip to China; two participants assess the news from the AIDS conference in Geneva; Mark Shields & Paul Gigot analyze the week's politics; and poet laureate Robert Pinsky offers a Walt Whitman poem for the 4th of July. It all follows our summary of the news this Holiday.% ? NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: All 30,000 residents of Flagler County, Florida, were ordered to leave their homes today. The Federal Emergency Management Agency said wildfires from three sides of the Atlantic Coast area threatened to merge into one big blaze. Two towns were burned early today, damaging 40 homes. The Flagler County evacuees joined 40,000 others who left Volusia and Brevard Counties yesterday. The fires have charred 300,000 acres in the last month. A hundred and fifty homes have been damaged or destroyed. A state official explained how the Forestry Department is handling the situation.

STATE OFFICIAL: You don't fight fires like this. You pull your people back, protect their safety, protect the residents' safety; you wait for wind shift, humidity changes, weather changes that cause the fire weather to ease off, and then you go back and start plowing lines and spraying water, and doing what you can do.

JIM LEHRER: The fires ruined many holiday plans, especially fireworks displays. A major stock car race in Daytona was canceled and 100 miles of interstate highway remained closed because thick smoke reduced vision. President Clinton said today there can be and will be democracy in China. He said he didn't know when but he hoped it would be in his lifetime. He spoke at a news conference in Hong Kong at the close of his nine-day tour of China. He also said he was encouraged by Japan's plan to revive its economy and thought it would work in a reasonable amount of time.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: It's not a situation like, oh, the Depression in the United States in the 30's, which took literally years and years to work out of, because we had fallen so much below anything that they're facing now. And we didn't have anything like the sophisticated understanding or the sophisticated economy or capacity in the 30's that they have now.

JIM LEHRER: The Clintons then departed at midnight local time for a 16-hour flight to Washington. They'll be back in time for July 4th festivities. We'll talk more about the President's trip right after this News Summary. In Japan today Prime Minister Hashimoto endorsed permanent tax cuts aimed at fixing this country's economic problems. The government announced the proposal yesterday. It must still be approved by the parliament. World markets were mixed in response. Tokyo's stock exchange closed up today for the eighth straight day, recovering almost 10 percent of recent losses. There was no trading on Wall Street because of the Independence Day Holiday. The 12th World AIDS Conference ended today in Geneva. Doctors and researchers predicted 40 million people will be afflicted by the turn of the century. A major theme of the week-long meeting was how to provide treatments to victims in the world's poorest countries. The next conference will be in the year 2000in South Africa. We'll have more on this story later in the program. Serb forces recaptured a key Kosovo town called Kiovo today, breaking a two-week siege by Albanian separatists. There were conflicting reports of casualties. US envoy Richard Holbrooke had described Kiovo as the most dangerous place in Europe. He met today with Yugoslav President Milosevic in Belgrade. They discussed ways of coming to a cease-fire. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to the end of the President's trip to China; an AIDS update; Shields & Gigot; and some 4th of July poetry.% ? FOCUS - AN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE

JIM LEHRER: The President's China trip. We begin with a report onhis last day by Spencer Michels.

SPENCER MICHELS: President Clinton began his final day in China today meeting with pro-democracy leaders and Hong Kong legislators to discuss reforms in China. He was given a warm reception. Hong Kong Democratic Party Leader Martin Lee met alone with the President for 20 minutes. The President had not been expected to meet with Lee, and when the meeting was scheduled, there was to be no news coverage allowed, a decision that was later reversed. Lee, who was just elected to the local legislature, urged more action on human rights in China.

MARTIN LEE: And I want to see the door remain open, and I want to see more concrete results, like the release of those dissidents, like the reversal of the verdict on Tiananmen Square massacre, and there be freedom for the Chinese people.

SPENCER MICHELS: In a speech to Hong Kong business leaders Mr. Clinton concentrated on opening markets and on the Asian financial crisis, but in a news conference marking the end of his nine-day China trip he returned to the theme of democracy and human rights.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: Clearly, China is changing, but there remain powerful forces resisting change, as evidenced by continuing governmental restrictions on free speech, assembly, and freedom of worship. One of the questions I have tried to frame on this trip for the future is: How do we deal with these issues in a way most likely to promote progress? The answer I think is clear-dealing directly, forcefully, but respectfully with the Chinese about our values.

REPORTER: You spoke a minute ago about the powerful forces resisting change in China. Do you believe there could ever be democracy here?

PRESIDENT CLINTON: Oh, yes. The answer to the second question is, yes. I believe there can be, and I believe there will be. And what I would like to see is the present government, headed by this president and this premier, who are clearly committed to reform, ride the wave of change and take China fully into the 21st century and basically dismantle the resistance to it.

REPORTER: You just said now that democracy will come to China. What is the time frame for that? Will it happen in your lifetime?

PRESIDENT CLINTON: I certainly hope so. That's like saying-you know, I don't mean to trivialize the question but let me give you-do I believe a woman will be elected President of the United States-I do. Do I think it'll be a good thing? I do. Do I know when it'll happen? I don't. Who will make the decision-the American people.

SPENCER MICHELS: At the news conference Mr. Clinton was asked why during his stay he didn't meet with dissidents.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: I did my best to meet with people who represented all elements of Chinese society--because I believe over the long run what you want is a change in the policy and the attitude of the Chinese government on whole--not just on this, that, or the other specific imprisoned dissident or threatened dissident -- although those things are very important. I don't want to minimize that. I felt that by going directly to engage the Chinese, starting with the President, and especially taking advantage of the opportunity to have this free and open debate before all the Chinese people, I could do more in the short and in the long run to advance the cause of human rights.

SPENCER MICHELS: The President took a question about alleged Chinese money in the 1996 US Presidential campaign.

REPORTER: During your news conference with President Jiang, he mentioned that you raised campaign fundraising with him. And I wonder if you could share with us just what ideas you expressed to him.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: The question here, the question that was raised that was most troubling was whether people at high levels in the government of China had either sanctioned or participated in the channeling of funds in violation of American law not only into the presidential campaign but into a number of congressional campaigns. That charge has been made. He said they looked into that, and he was, obviously, certain, and I do believe him that he had not ordered or authorized or approved such a thing, and that he could find no evidence that anybody in governmental authority had done that.

SPENCER MICHELS: He was also asked about comments he made earlier in the trip opposing independence for Taiwan, and whether that opposition would take away Taiwan's bargaining power.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: The substance of the policy is obviously something that the Chinese government agrees with. I think what the Taiwan government wants to hear is that we favor the cross-strait dialogue and we think it has to be done peacefully and in an orderly fashion.

SPENCER MICHELS: The President was also asked specifically about President Jiang, and he praised the Chinese leader as someone with good imagination, vision, and energy, someone who can bring change to China.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: However, I think that like everyone else, he has constituencies with which he must work. And I hope that more of them are now more convinced that we can build a good, positive partnership as a result of this trip. I hope more of them understand that America wishes China well; that we are not bent on containing China, and that our human rights policy is not an excuse for some larger strategic motive. It's what we really believe. We believe it's morally right and we believe it's best for them, as a practical matter, over the long run. So I believe that there's a very good chance that China has the right leadership at the right time, and that they understand the daunting, massive nature of the challenges they face.

SPENCER MICHELS: Following the news conference, President Clinton and his family headed home to Washington.

JIM LEHRER: And to Elizabeth Farnsworth in San Francisco.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Now the President's trip as seen by four Chinese-Americans. Nien Cheng is the author of "Life and Death in Shanghai," an account of her six-year imprisonment during the Chinese cultural revolution. She was born in Beijing and now lives in Washington, D.C.; Eric Liu is a former speechwriter for President Clinton and author of the "Accidential Asian," which explores what it means to be Chinese-American. He was born in the United States and is enrolled now at Harvard Law School. Bright Sheng is a composer and conductor of classical music and a professor at the University of Michigan. He was born in Shanghai and came to the United States in 1982. He comes to us tonight from a television newsroom in Detroit. And Maxine Hong Kingston is the author of "The Woman Warrior" and "China Men," among other works. She was born in Stockton, California, and teaches English at the University of California, Berkeley. Thank you all for being with us. Nien Cheng, do you agree with what we just heard the President say, that there will be democracy in China?

NIEN CHENG, Author: Yes. I think so too. I agree with what he said. I was born in 1915. I have lived through the Chinese-many Chinese regimes: The Peking government warlord era, the Nationalist government, and the Communist government, and Mao Tse Tung. I think the present leadership is the best China ever had.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And why? What do you see, and what did you see during the trip that makes you optimistic?

NIEN CHENG: Oh, because I saw that President Jiang Zemin allowed press conference, as well as President Clinton's speech at Badah to be broadcast directly to the Chinese people. That is a big step forward. I believe President Jiang Zemin and Prime Minister Dur-Run Gie will gradually lead China into democracy.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Go ahead, sorry.

NIEN CHENG: Maybe I won't live to see it, because I'm very old, but the President certainly will live to see it.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Eric Liu, do you agree?

ERIC LIU, Author: Well, I think that, you know, the President artfully evaded the question of time frame. I think there will be something like democracy in China at some point in the future. I think one thing we have to be clear about, though, is that we use that word "democracy" in kind of a one-size-fits-all way, democracy meaning merely the practice of voting an election, it's something we might see in the President's lifetime. But there's another piece of the puzzle too, and that is liberal constitutionalism, the rule of law, civil rights, political rights, which you can have without democracy and which you can not have even when you do have democracy. So I think that whether or not China becomes liberal in a free sense, in terms of civil rights, is another question altogether.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And Bright Sheng, did what you see during the trip make you optimistic about democracy and the future in China?

BRIGHT SHENG, Composer, Conductor: I basically agree with what these other two of my colleagues said, and I feel strongly that it is coming from President Jiang. I understand, you know, this kind of broadcasting live coverage, that speech by an American president talking directly to Chinese people is the first time after the 50 years, some of the Communist regime, and I strongly believe that it is coming from Mr. Jiang not under American pressure or because it's a gesture as a host for the American president, but he truly wanted that to happen, to want to have the American president's message cross over to the Chinese people. Thank you.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And Maxine Hong Kingston, what was your response to seeing that joint press conference and seeing the President directly address the Chinese people? Did you have a strong response when you saw it?

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON, Author: Yes. It felt very good. There is--a communication was taking place, and I felt that the president communicated the values of democracy very well. I liked it, but right from the start he spoke about human rights as universal rights. It's a universal value for every human being. It wasn't-they talked across and through cultures. There wasn't this idea that human rights and democracy are merely western kinds of thinking. I think the Chinese and Americans agreed what we mean by democracy and what we mean by human rights. And the thought that-I think that we all agree-you just don't go into Tibet and torture nuns. I think the president of China was very open to listening to that.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Are you more optimistic now? I mean, you have been to China several times. You've spoken to students at Beijing University, like the president did, as an author. You've spoken as an eminent person in China. Do you feel more optimistic after what you saw happen during this trip about democracy in China?

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: Yes. I do feel optimistic. I saw when the president went to Bada that-

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: That's the university.

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: Yes. The University of Beijing-that there were guards and walls and barbed wire around the school. But it was that way before. After Tiananmen Square the schools were cordoned off, but it's still like that, but I also feel a difference in the way students spoke. I was there one year after Tiananmen Square, and the students were-I felt they were very shy, sweet, hesitant, and they asked me questions that made me think that they were not getting all the news, that they were getting propaganda. When I saw the students speak to the President, it was with a great deal of confidence. It was as if they're used to speaking up and speaking out-very challenging.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Eric Liu, I was struck in your book. You wrote that being Chinese-American in this period is to "experience an odd foreboding exhilaration." Why did you say that, and how does the trip fit into that?

ERIC LIU: It's exhilaration. It's one that is both odd and foreboding. I mean, it all comes from the sense that I have. Right now I'm just feeling so fortunate to be alive and awake and aware at a time when American power and Chinese power are the powers that really matter in the world and when these things are so much in flux. I think that that is so much part of the sense of awe, the rise of China, really highlights in a sense the role and the place that Chinese-Americans and to an extent Asian-Americans generally occupy in American life. The foreboding comes from the same trend actually, Elizabeth, and that is that the rise of China and the rise of Asia have created a bit of anxiety, I think, in our politics and in our culture. I wouldn't say it's quite to the levels of yellow peril stereotyping and the rest. But there exists and undercurrent of anxiety about what China's rise means for America. And I think that then puts a little bit of pressure and puts the Chinese-Americans on the spot in some circumstances.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Bright Sheng, do you agree with that, and do you think the President's trip made any difference in that?

NIEN CHENG: I'm delighted.

BRIGHT SHENG: Yes, I do.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: I'm sorry. Nien Cheng, I asked Bright Sheng. I'll come to you in a second.

NIEN CHENG: I'm sorry. I didn't get it.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: That's okay.

BRIGHT SHENG: That's all right. Yes. I certainly agree with Eric Liu's assessment, but I also feel that President Clinton did very good job this time, because he was thoughtful enough, without being offensive, and I think for Chinese people this is, you know, the way that they allowed him to mention about Tiananmen Square 10 years ago, almost 10 years ago, incident, and it was to the Chinese people directly without live coverage. That's something a great deal-for every single Chinese people living in China and outside China, for that matter. But I feel that things like that, that allowed him to speak to Chinese people but without being so offensive that will offend the Chinese government. At the same time I think just like the Cultural Revolution, the one that was just finished, the Chinese government did not come out just say, okay, now, the Cultural Revolution was a mistake, it was wrong. They said the Cultural Revolution was over. Now, gradually, of course, after a few years they say the Cultural Revolution was-is a mistake. So I think this is a time gradually we will see certainly in the next few years a reversal of the verdict of Tiananmen Square. I'm hopeful.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And Nien Chung, do you feel that windows like the one that Bright Sheng just mentioned were opened by this trip, and windows being opened in a way that's important for Chinese-Americans?

NIEN CHENG: Yes. You know, as an immigrant, we love America, and wouldn't it be a disaster if America and China have to fight each other? I can't face that, because I'm still sentimentally attached to the country in which I was born and with which I have such very close association. So I'm very happy to see better relationship and even friendship between America and China. And-

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Go ahead. I'm sorry.

NIEN CHENG: Actually, even before the President's visit, there are many Americans already working in China. There are Americans helping China to carry out these village elections, and there are two young people who work there with the Chinese, about village elections. China already started the first step towards democracy with the village elections. Half of China's villages now can-the villagers can elect own boss, so to speak, their own official. Eventually, these will be carried to the county level and gradually, gradually to the central government. So China has already taken the first step towards democracy. It's a long road, but step by step China will get there.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Maxine Hong Kingston, do you share Eric Liu's concern that there is a tendency for stereotyping and for, you know, the dangers of looking at Chinese-Americans in a negative way as China grows more powerful and that this trip might have helped in some way?

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: Well, I think that's-the trip which we all saw on television-we could see that there are a billion people out there that look like me, and in a negative way Americans can then see someone like me not recognize a fellow American. And I think that by looking elsewhere, that is not the way to understand more about America. And-

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: In other words, you don't think Americans should be looking to China to understand more about Chinese-Americans.

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: Yes. That's right. To understand Chinese-Americans we need to look at ourselves and, you know, we're all very visual, and when we see somebody who looks like this, many people-I think a lot of people, most people, would say, where did you come from? And even smart people do this. I think there has to be a way of looking, so that when critics, for example, when they read my work, they won't think of it as Chinese literature but they can say, look, she's working on the great American novel. We have to be able to see ourselves and see that we look all different ways.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Eric Liu, is there anything that you wish the President had accomplished that he didn't on this trip?

ERIC LIU: Well, I think that-I mean, I would preface it by saying that I think the trip was, in general, a huge success for the president and really beneficial for the relations between the countries. But I do think, particularly given how well it all went, that hindsight shows us maybe that there are some things that he could have done a little bit more, and some areas where he could have taken a little bit more of a risk, I think certainly in the question of meeting with dissidents. That certainly was something that I wish he had taken an effort to do. And I think even, frankly, although he's gotten a lot of credit for talking about human rights in a universal way, if you actually listen to the words that he used and to the way that he used these words in his press conference and elsewhere, there's just a hint of cultural relativism at work there. And that's something that I find a little bit worrisome. I think there's something that-

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: What do you mean by that? I think you're disagreeing with what Maxine Hong Kingston said earlier.

ERIC LIU: No. Well, I think that the president certainly did enunciate the idea that human rights are universal. But he prefaced that enunciation with a caveat, and the caveat was that Chinese circumstances are such that it's not for Americans to judge how the Chinese go about doing things. And I think he was trying, as he ought to, as a diplomat and as a statesman, to be sure not to offend Chinese sensibilities. But for someone with American sensibilities, myself, I do wish that he had been a little bit more forceful in his enunciation that, you know, there is no such thing as Asian values, at least Asian values define in terms of autocracy and deferral to autocracy.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Nien Chung, what do you think about that? Do you wish he'd been a little more forceful?

NIEN CHENG: No. I think he did just right, because he is the guest, and you really can't say something so impolite, so direct to your host. He's the guest in China. I think he did just right.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Well, thank you all very much for being with us.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, an AIDS update, Shields & Gigot, and Pinsky reads Whitman.% ? UPDATE - HOPE & FEAR

JIM LEHRER: Phil Ponce has the AIDS story.

PHIL PONCE: The 12th World AIDS Conference came to a close today in Geneva, offering a mixed picture of progress in the 17-year battle against AIDS. The biennial meeting brought together more than 12,000 scientists, health officials, and activists. An estimated 11.7 million people have died of AIDS since the epidemic began. According to a new UN report, more than 30 million people are living with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, or with AIDS itself. More than 90 percent of them live in developing countries, many in Sub-Saharan Africa. The report estimated close to six million new infections last year, with the fastest growth coming from Africa, Asia, and the former Soviet republics.

DR. PETER PIOT, Executive Director, UN AIDS Program: We even found two countries, Zimbabwe and Botswana, in Southern Africa, where as many as one adult out of every four adults is HIV positive.

PHIL PONCE: This year's conference focused on patients in developing countries who cannot afford the expensive new drugs that extend life. Toward that end, several pharmaceutical companies announced that AIDS medicines will be sold at a discount in poorer countries. The UN also announced a pilot program to treat 30,000 pregnant women who have HIV women in Africa. Women in Africa countries will be given the drug, AZT, which can help reduce the transmission of the virus from mothers to babies.

DR. PETER HAWLEY, Whitman Walker Clinic: For the first time, we have a strategy to help prevent transmission to children that becomes affordable and feasible for countries such as ours and for those women, it really does provide some hope.

PHIL PONCE: There was other promising news: Researchers said patients may not have to take as many pills a day because of two new medicines. They block an essential enzyme that HIV needs in order to take over cells and replicate itself. And a new study showed that a person's immune system can recover even after AIDS has weakened it. But there was also some bad news. Scientists reported two cases in which HIV became resistant to most AIDS drugs available. Other research found that even when drug combinations do work in fighting off aids, HIV could not be eliminated entirely from the bloodstream. Another study showed that up to 15 percent of patients taking protease inhibitor drugs- which suppress the growth of Aids--suffered a change in the distribution of their body fat. And yesterday came the news that an AIDS vaccine tested on monkeys had not worked. Researchers had hoped to use it as a model for a human vaccine.

PHIL PONCE: With us now are two experts just back from the conference: Dr. David Ho is director of the Aaron Diamond Research Center in New York. He's one of the researchers credited with pioneering the drug combinations now being used by AIDS patients. Dr. Anthony Fauci is director of the National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health. He oversees funding for government-sponsored AIDS research throughout the country. Gentlemen, welcome to you both.Dr. Fauci, how would you assess where you are in the fight against AIDS?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Diseases: I think we've come along way, and as was manifested at the meeting, there have been a number of important advances. The tone of the meeting was one I would say of some sober reality testing in which we are realizing that we've come a long way. We've seen some obstacles appear that we need to overcome, but there are pretty good directions and plans on how to overcome them. So I think the meeting was a positive meeting and the mood was one that we have a lot of work to do but we've also come a very long way.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Ho, your big picture assessment.

DR. DAVID HO, Aaron Diamond Research Center: I agree with what Dr. Fauci just discussed. I think we heard both good news and bad news. The enormity of the epidemic, as was mentioned, was certainly impressive. And obviously the situation in the developing countries cannot be treated with the current medications. On the other hand, we heard about the impressive record of combination of therapy, resulting in substantial decrease in mortality in this country and in Europe. In addition we heard about several new drugs and several new promising drug combinations.

PHIL PONCE: Before we get to some of those, some of those promising new drugs, your assessment on the attempt to bridge the gap between the countries that are experiencing the growth in AIDS and the resources that they have to fight AIDS, Dr. Ho.

DR. DAVID HO: Well, I think the gap is huge. These combination therapies we have in the states are so expensive they're simply out of the question for the developing countries, many of which have only a few dollars per year per citizen. So the gap is certainly too large at this point.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Fauci, what is your assessment of prospects for a cure for people who already are infected?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: I think for the purposes of clarity we shouldn't at this point use the word "cure" but use the word of effective control of the virus, because when you talk about cure, you generally think of completely eliminating each and every viral infected cell from the body. And we know from recent work that that's going to be difficult but doesn't mean that we shouldn't strive to do that because that's a goal that we should strive for. But, nonetheless, it's going to be difficult, and it's going to take many years of people being on therapy to do that. So I think we have a good chance of very good control of the virus in individuals now and particularly as new drugs come along. Whether or not we're going to effectively cure, as it were, individuals, I'm not so sure about that. But that may not be so bad. We may be able to have a major, major impact, as we already are having, on the lives of individuals, the morbidity and mortality, short of a cure.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Ho, what is the-in lay terms-what is the big hurdle in finding a cure?

DR. DAVID HO: Well, the major obstacle in the road to eradicating HIV is really the persistence of the virus in the dormant state in certain T-cells. And in this form the virus is protected from the drugs that we use, and since these T-cells can live for a long period of time, it's extremely difficult to stop the medications, because this reservoir would rekindle the whole infection if we were to stop the medications.

PHIL PONCE: So are you saying that it's the dormancy in the cells that, in a sense, protects them from the drugs that seek them out?

DR. DAVID HO: That's correct. The virus in those cells lie dormant and, therefore, the drugs cannot get at them.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Ho, President Clinton has made it a stated goal of his to come up with a vaccine in nine years. Is that doable, do you think?

DR. DAVID HO: I think it's a reasonable objective. Obviously it's a tall order. The research in the vaccine field has not progressed as fast as the situation for drug development; however, we do know from certain animal experiment that vaccine protection is achievable, and, therefore, it holds promise for the future.

PHIL PONCE: Certain animal experiments relating to AIDS?

DR. DAVID HO: Relating to SIV, which is a relative of HIV in monkeys.

PHIL PONCE: What is your assessment of where the government is as far as finding a vaccine?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: I think that the 10-year goal that the President set last year is a reasonable goal that I believe we have a good chance of accomplishing. When you have something like a vaccine that's such an elusive, difficult thing, particularly because of the special nature of HIV vaccine, you can never say for sure. You can predict that we will likely have one in ten years, but science moves in such a way because it's a discovery process, that you can never guarantee it. But as a scientist, I feel-and I'm sure that Dr. Ho also feels-that it's totally within reason to feel that we can do it within 10 years.

PHIL PONCE: What do you say to people who look at other government attempts to "cure cancer" and that sort of thing in a specified amount of time and that hasn't necessarily happened?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, that's the reason why you set a goal. You set a goal. You don't guarantee anything, and setting a goal of 10 years is reasonable. But don't forget that there's a big difference between HIV, which is a single infectious agent, and cancer as a field. So when you talk about curing cancer, you're talking about a very complicated, complex process. When you talk about developing a vaccine, as difficult as it may be, at least you can sharply focus on that goal.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Ho, there have been a couple of cases where patients have responded-have not responded at all to some of the drugs that have been effective in everyone else. Do these cases-is it something that people should be extremely worried about?

DR. DAVID HO: I think in Geneva we heard about certain cases of new HIV infection from viruses that have become resistant to the currently available drugs. I think this is certainly alarming to some extent in that those individuals who are infected with resistant viruses will not respond in the same way to our current drugs. However, we should not blow them out of proportion in that this is a situation that's still occurring in low numbers, low frequency, andcertainly does not speak of a doomsday scenario. Nevertheless, these few cases serve nicely to remind people that we have to work on prevention. There's still too many new infections occurring each year in the US, as well as everywhere else.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Fauci, do you think people have been lulled into a sense of complacency by some of the successes, and how do these new cases sort of fit into that?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, I'm certainly certain individuals have. We hope it hasn't been widespread, but we know from our interaction with the community that there has been a feeling among individuals that if you get infected in 1998, because we have such effective drugs, that that's not so bad, because you can very adequately treat these infections. The cases that we heard about in Geneva, particularly the one from San Francisco, about the sexual transmission of a multiple drug-resistant virus, you know, is sort of like a wake-up call to people that if you happen to be unfortunate enough to get infected from an individual who has the multiple drug-resistant virus, that's sort of like turning the clock back and getting infected back in the early 80's, when we had no drugs at all. So hopefully, something like this, if anything good comes to it, it will underscore the need to continue to emphasize prevention, because this is a clearly preventable disease. And we need to do everything we can to get people to be aware of what they need to do to prevent infection.

PHIL PONCE: And Dr. Fauci, how about the issue of new drugs and new treatments, what's in the pipeline?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Well, there are several that we heard about in Geneva, drugs that were in the pipeline, drugs that are second and third generation drugs, particularly drugs that not only are as powerful or appear to be as powerful as some of the standard drugs we have now, but that are more user-friendly, and that they can be given in less dosages; you don't have to take four or five times a day of a particular dose. Some of them, for example, you need to take one or at the most two times a day. Whether or not they're going to be totally effective against a virus that has already developed resistance against the standard first generation of drugs is not clear, but at least in their present form they appear to be at least as powerful as the ones that we have now. So it's good news about pipeline.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Fauci, in the past, notwithstanding the scope of the problem as you described it and as you learn more about in Geneva, you've expressed optimism about the fight against AIDS. Why is that? I'm sorry. Dr. Ho.

DR. DAVID HO: Well, we have learned so much about this virus in the past decade and a half, so many drugs have been developed for one single virus, and as we just heard, there are several more in the pipeline. And physicians and scientists have learned how to combine these drugs to effectively control HIV replication, resulting in meaningful differences for patients in the US and in Europe. All these have been rather impressive developments and certainly is the cause of my optimism.

PHIL PONCE: Dr. Ho, Dr. Fauci, thank you both.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Good to be here.% ? FOCUS - POLITICAL WRAP

JIM LEHRER: Now some Shields & Gigot, syndicated columnist Mark Shields, Wall Street Journal columnist Paul Gigot.Mark, the President's China trip, the New York Times had a front page story today which said as a political issue China no longer exists, even the Republicans are praising what the President did. Do you read it the same way?

MARK SHIELDS: Well, certainly the praise for the President from people, leading Republicans, former Vice Presidential Nominee Jack Kemp called it great, and even Speaker Newt Gingrich, who is very critical of the President, was quite generous in his praise. There's no question, Jim, that the mainstream of the Republican Party, the leadership of the Republican Party, essentially endorses Bill Clinton's policy of trade engagement, economic engagement, with the Chinese and with minimal criticism of Chinese policies. There are those Republicans, however, and I'd list Gary Bauer of the Family Research Council and John Ashcroft and others, who have been more critical on the right and left of the Democratic Party, but I'd certainly say right now, as of today, Bill Clinton has done what he did in the State of the Union, when so many of us who were ready to write him off, as Mary Magrory, the Pulitzer Prize winning columnist, said, this is a man who really rises to the occasion, and he has done so over there.

JIM LEHRER: Do you agree?

PAUL GIGOT: I do agree. I think we did find out this week what Bill Clinton is going to do after he's President. He's going to run for mayor of Shanghai. He treated this like a campaign, and if there's one thing we know about President Clinton it's he knows how to campaign. And he was on Talk Radio; he was on-he got the Chinese president to give him-granted, it was a close-run thing-they didn't know until minutes before-but he gave him that national audience in China. And I think the President handled that very well. He stood up for American principles. He said freedom is indivisible, meaning that economic liberty is going to produce over time political freedom. I think that the evidence of that happening is elsewhere in Asia and Taiwan and South Korea. And he made that case well. Now he created some problems for him down the road, I think, with changing US policy towards Taiwan, and that may be an issue that resurrects itself over time.

JIM LEHRER: Where will that be at issue?

PAUL GIGOT: I think that will be an issue in Congress. It'll be an issue in Congress, which has always been more supportive than the executive branch is, ever since Nixon went to China towards Taiwan, and I think if you see Taiwan-if you see the sort of a backlash in Taiwan, which the President's distanced himself, I think, from US support for Taiwan-if that has a backlash effect, where the independence parties in Taiwan begin to assert themselves more and do better, that could begin to create more problems, rather than less.

JIM LEHRER: Mark, what are the domestic US politics on Taiwan? Explain where the bodies are, et cetera.

MARK SHIELDS: Well, historically, the strongest support for Taiwan came from the conservative Republicans, who grew in prominence within the party, after the loss of China, loss of China is a way of phrasing it. It wasn't ours to lose, you could make the case, but it became a great political domestic issue 50 years ago in this country.

JIM LEHRER: In support of Changkaishek-

MARK SHIELDS: Changkaishek-who lost China for the Communists-

JIM LEHRER: Okay.

MARK SHIELDS: And the charges were that there had been a Democratic administration and a number of Republicans rallied too-and there had been a strong support, been a strong Protestant-American support, because of Mrs. Changkaishek in this country, the missionary movement. And so-and the Time Magazine publication-so that had been the original, but I think, Paul is right. There's two things, Jim. The President stated a policy which had been the policy of this country, but it had never been stated by a President, and he stated it.

JIM LEHRER: So it had kind of been implied-

MARK SHIELDS: And he stated it in China.

PAUL GIGOT: In fictional ambiguity.

JIM LEHRER: In fictional ambiguity. Called diplomacy.

MARK SHIELDS: He stated it in China, and the policy is pretty bald, and it's-no independence, no two Chinas, no one Taiwan, no one China, and no membership in any international organization for Taiwan, so he's basically taken 21 million-or we have-21 million people and said, you are denied self-determination, which is not what the universal declaration of human rights embodies.

PAUL GIGOT: Twenty-one million people who have free elections. We're worried about self-determination now in Kosovo, in Bosnia, and threatening saber rattling, that we might go to war to make sure that happens, and in Taiwan, he suggests maybe we wouldn't go to war.

JIM LEHRER: Now who in the political-in our political landscape today is likely to raise that as an issue against Democrats and the President?

PAUL GIGOT: I would say that that is an issue that unites the entire Republican Party.

JIM LEHRER: Is that right?

PAUL GIGOT: That is one that unites economic and social conservatives. It's one that unites even Republicans who disagree about trade with China. So I would say the entire Republican Party would begin to make an issue of that if it became one.

JIM LEHRER: Yes.

MARK SHIELDS: I don't-I really don't think so. I think the Republican Party has made its bargain. It's made its bargain on trade. I mean, Nancy Pelosi, the congresswoman from San Francisco, stated very bluntly, she said, American policy in China is determined by three factors: Boeing, Boeing, Boeing, and there's no question-

JIM LEHRER: You're talking as in airplane.

MARK SHIELDS: As in airplane, and there's no-I mean, sold 50 the last time they were over here, sold 10 this time, and there's no question that-I mean, Speaker Gingrich is representing the fact that that is a large influential segment of the Republican Party. I'm not saying it isn't within the Democratic Party too. It most certainly is.

PAUL GIGOT: I disagree with Mark. I mean, he makes it sound like it's, you know, profits of shareholders and that's it. There's a real strong strategic case to be made for liberty on economic areas. When you open up, when you force people to have information, when you force people to have contracts, legally binding contracts, which you do when you have free markets, it can produce a middle class, rising incomes, that can lead to political freedom. It's happened elsewhere in the world. China may be the exception to this, but that's the argument, and that's the bet, and it's a lot more than net profits for Boeing Corporation.

MARK SHIELDS: It did not happen in South Africa. I mean, all the corporate involvement, all the corporate interests. It did not happen in Singapore. It has not happened in Malaysia. I just think that this argument that somehow we'll make a profit, we'll make a quick buck, we will ignore over the long run it's going to be good for the people in the gulags, it's really-the people in the slave labor camp are going to feel those lashes a lot less seriously because profits are rising. And there's no question Paul's right about there was a full discussion, full debate, and all the rest of it. Jim, the Chinese administration, regime can tolerate harsh words now, because they are de-linked, they know there's no policy changes and because there's not going to be any implications or recriminations on the part of the United States by what we say.

PAUL GIGOT: China is in many ways a nasty regime, but I'll tell you, the first time I visited in 1979, it was a much nastier regime than when I visited last year. And it's changed enormously, and there's a lot more ability to worship than there was. There's a lot more ability to see what the rest of the world is, and I think that that influence-our influence there will undermine eventually the Communist dictatorship, and that's the be the President's making.

JIM LEHRER: Let's move to a real domestic issue, and that's a real, real domestic-the Starr investigation-Linda Tripp, the woman who taped Monica Lewinsky, is finally telling her story to the Kenneth Starr grand jury. Is there any more to be said about it than that?

PAUL GIGOT: Not very much. Not until we know what that story is, not until we know what that story's impact is on say Monica Lewinsky and her willingness to cut a deal to Ken Starr. That's, I think, the biggest play here, the biggest decision facing this investigation is will Monica Lewinsky cooperate and how will she cooperate with Ken Starr? Linda Tripp's effect on that is important. Otherwise, we've just got to wait and see.

MARK SHIELDS: It's been a long time coming, and it's just amazing now how it developed this art form in Washington, where we have to humanize people. Linda Tripp showed up with her son and her daughter, which is fine, and her lawyer comes out and says she's sleeping well, because-

JIM LEHRER: She told the truth.

MARK SHIELDS: --because she told the truth. There's a sense of we got to get her numbers up, her negatives are too high in the Gallup Poll.

PAUL GIGOT: Well, considering the abuse she's taken from people who she couldn't defend herself, I don't know, I'd appear with dogs or whatever it took to get-she's been really maligned.

JIM LEHRER: She had bad press.

MARK SHIELDS: I take that personally.

JIM LEHRER: Speaking of negatives--that's called our transition--how big a setback was-for Starr was this dismissal with tax charges against Webster Hubbell.

PAUL GIGOT: It probably means that we'll never hear all of what Webster Hubbell knows, even if this is overturned on appeal, or as there seems to be-

JIM LEHRER: You're making the assumption that he knows a lot that he isn't telling, and that's what Kenneth Starr's assuming, right?

PAUL GIGOT: Ken Starr believes it. Ken Starr believes that he had an immunity deal with Webster Hubbell to cooperate, and the sooner that immunity deal was struck, he developed memory loss, and ever since, he's been trying to discover why he hasn't cooperated, and that's why you've had the trail of jobs that he got in pursuing that, and trying to develop what Starr suspects may be a case of obstruction. But it looks-if this case doesn't go ahead, we'll never find out.

MARK SHIELDS: Ken Starr is on a losing streak. I mean, if we said Linda Tripp's got to refurbish her public image, this is the fellow who took a hit in the Supreme Court last week on privilege. He go-

JIM LEHRER: Because of the attorney-client privilege-

MARK SHIELDS: The attorney-client-Vince Foster-this week he took a really big hit on the judge throwing out the case, and basically said 13,000 pages of information that Web Hubbell had turned over under grant of immunity had then been used by the independent counsel, self-incrimination, abrogating the entire Fifth Amendment. So it was a big hit. Then Susan McDougal walks as well until he gets out of prison, and I think what it means more than anything else, beyond the legal implications, is that the Republicans on Capitol Hill, who've shown verylittle appetite to engage in this, they're counting upon not only a strong report from Ken Starr to be delivered to the Congress. They're also-it's being delivered by a strong and credible independent counsel, and anything that erodes his strength and his independence and credibility I think strengthens the President in a strange way and it hurts the Republican case.

JIM LEHRER: Do you agree?

PAUL GIGOT: Well, that's the White House gamble, which-it's not really a gamble, but it's a strategy, which is we don't know what the report will say, so you hurt the messenger, Ken Starr, and that certainly doesn't give Republicans confidence, but one thing that might restore credibility is the nature of the report, the facts on the report.

JIM LEHRER: The case itself.

PAUL GIGOT: If the case happens to be strong, well, maybe it doesn't matter how corrupt you think the messenger is, or how partisan, if the case is strong itself.

JIM LEHRER: We have to go. Thank you both.% ? FINALLY - SONG OF OURSELVES

JIM LEHRER: And, finally tonight some Happy Birthday America words from NewsHour contributor Robert Pinsky, the Poet Laureate of the United States.

ROBERT PINSKY, Poet Laureate: No one has ever captured the contradictory and inclusive nature of American life better than Walt Whitman. For the 4th of July here are some lines from "Song of Myself:"I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise,/ Regardless of others, ever regardful of others,/Maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man,/Stuff'd with the stuff that is coarse and stuff'd with the stuff that is fine,/One of the great nations, the Nation of many nations, the smallest the same and/the largest the same,/A Southerner soon as a Northerner, a planter nonchalant and hospitable,/A Yankee bound my own way ready for trade, my joints the/limberest joints on earth and the sternest joints on earth,/A Kentuckian walking the vale of the Elkhorn in my deer-skin/leggings, /A boatman over the lakes or bays or along coasts, a Hoosier, Badger,/a Buckeye, a Louisianian or Georgian, a poke-easy from/Sand Hills and Pines/At home on Canadian snow-shoes or up in the bush, or with/fishermen off Newfoundland,/At home in the fleet of ice-boats, sailing with the rest and tacking,/At home on the hills of Vermont or in the woods of Maine, or/in the woods of Maine, or the Texan ranch,/Comrade of Californians, comrade of free North-Westerners,/loving their big proportions,/Comrade of raftsmen and coalmen, comrade of all who shake/ hands and welcome to drink and meat,/ A learner with the simplest, a teacher of the thoughtfullest,/A novice beginning experient of myriads of seasons,/ Of every hue and trade and rank, of every caste and religion,/Not nearly of the new world but of Africa, Europe, or Asia,/A wandering savage, a farmer, mechanic, or artist, a gentleman, sailor, lover, or quaker,/A prisoner, fancy-man, rowdy, lawyer, physician, or priest./ I resist any thing better than my own diversity,/ And breathe the air and leave plenty after me,/And am not stuck up, and am in my place,/ The moth and the fish-eggs are in their place,/The suns I see and the suns I cannot see are in their/place,/The palpable is in its place and the impalpable is in its place.% ? RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Holiday Friday, 30,000 residents were ordered to evacuate as wildfires swept Northeast Florida. They joined 40,000 others who fled their homes yesterday. And President Clinton is on his way home from a nine-day tour of China. He said he believed there can be and will be democracy in China, but he could not predict when. We'll see you on-line and again here Monday evening. Have a nice 4th of July weekend. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.