The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening one more time from Madison Square Garden in New York City. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour this final night of the Republican National Convention: A conversation with former President George H.W. Bush; a look at what his son, the current president, may say in his acceptance speech tonight, with delegates, speechwriters, Michael Beschloss, Richard Norton Smith, and Meena Bose, and Mark Shields and David Brooks; plus the latest on Hurricane Frances, and the other news of this day.

JIM LEHRER: As President Bush made ready to address the Republican National Convention, Hurricane Frances plowed toward south Florida today. More than two million people were ordered away from the state's Atlantic Coast, traffic backed up on major highways, and stores sold out of bottled water and emergency goods. As of late today, Frances had winds of 145 miles per hour, and was headed toward a possible landfall tomorrow night. It was twice the size of Hurricane Charley, the storm that devastated the state's central gulf coast last month. Terence Smith has more on the storm. He spoke a short while ago to Alan Levine, the secretary of Health Care Administration in Florida.

TERENCE SMITH: Mr. Levine, tell us what you expect from the storm and why you felt you had to go ahead and order the evacuation.

ALAN LEVINE: Well, the evacuations were ordered by the emergency county operations centers based on the forecast from the national weather service that shows that this is a very large, a very dangerous hurricane; likely to affect the East Coast of Florida anywhere from the southern part of Florida to mid- central Florida. So it's a very serious storm.

TERENCE SMITH: And a huge number of people in its path, is that right?

ALAN LEVINE: Yes, sir. The southeast part of Florida is a very populated area. Our main concern, obviously, is the safety of the people that live there and that are visiting there, which is one of the reasons why the local folks ordered the evacuations.

TERENCE SMITH: How are those evacuations going? We see some pictures on television of long lines of cars. They're moving but there are a lot of cars.

ALAN LEVINE: There are. And one of the things we're encouraging people to do is to move ten miles, not necessarily a hundred miles. The roads can get very busy. We're monitoring that. In fact, the Florida highway patrol and the Florida Department of Transportation have been monitoring that on an ongoing basis and they have some opportunities to try to make the roads work a little bit more smoothly when the time comes. But at the moment, we're encouraging people to move ten miles inland rather than try to get a hundred miles away.

TERENCE SMITH: What can they do to speed it up if, indeed, they do get too congested?

ALAN LEVINE: Well, there are certain things they can do. They can reverse lanes. They can do other things to open up the traffic when it comes to that. Right now they are monitoring and the traffic is slowing down, but it is moving. And, again, I get back to the issue of trying to make sure people realize they don't have to leave 100 miles. If they get away from the coastal areas, if they have special needs, special medical needs, we want to get them to a special needs shelter and that's really what our main focus is right now.

TERENCE SMITH: What about people with special needs and people in hospitals? What are you doing about them?

ALAN LEVINE: Well, we've had some hospitals evacuate. We've had all of our hospitals and nursing homes in the state of Florida have evacuation plans. And some of those hospitals are executing those plans as we speak. We've had three or four hospitals transfer patients to the west coast of Florida and other parts of the state. And we work with them. They put... they request help from the state as needed and we will mobilize transportation if we need to or we'll work with inner government agencies to make sure we get them whatever resources they need.

TERENCE SMITH: Okay. And finally, did you learn any lessons that you might be applying now from Hurricane Charley just a few weeks ago?

ALAN LEVINE: Well, we've learned a lot of lessons, even since Hurricane Andrew. And one of the first lessons we've learned is to be prepared, to try to understand that the issue that's most important to everybody is safety. We've already... FEMA is already on the ground. They've been working very closely with us. We've got disaster medical assistance teams prepared to move in as soon as the storm passes -- once we know where we need to deploy those resources. And we've got, you know, ice, water, all of those resources are right now being staged. So as soon as the storm is over, we can get the resources where they need to be delivered to.

TERENCE SMITH: Okay, Alan Levine, thanks for bringing us up to date and good luck.

ALAN LEVINE: Thank you very much.

JIM LEHRER: Now to the Republican Convention here in New York City. The president formally accepts the party's nomination for a second term tonight. This afternoon, he visited Madison Square Garden to test the microphones. He'll speak tonight from a new stage, built overnight. It's a theater in the round, with delegates on all sides. In his speech, Mr. Bush is expected to outline plans for a second term, and offer himself as a strong wartime leader. This morning, Vice President Cheney underscored that message.

VICE PRESIDENT DICK CHENEY: He doesn't waffle, he doesn't agonize over it. He sits down, makes the basic decision, understands the significance of it, and then full speed ahead. And that's exactly what we need under these circumstances. We don't need indecision or confusion or somebody who's not quite certain exactly where they stand or what they believe.

JIM LEHRER: Last night, the vice president sharply criticized Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry over national security issues. The keynote speaker, Democratic Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia, also attacked Kerry. Today, Kerry's running mate, John Edwards, dismissed the criticism. He spoke in a Philadelphia suburb.

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS: The anger that we heard from senator miller, the anger that we heard from the vice president, anger is not going do change this country and do what needs to be done for America. (Cheers and applause And all the anger and venom that we saw focused on John Kerry, I wish we would see a little anger about the millions of people who've lost their health care, right?

JIM LEHRER: Kerry himself plans to return to campaigning tonight, right after the Republican Convention concludes. He'll hold a midnight rally in Springfield, Ohio. Convention protesters disrupted morning rush hour at New York's grand central station today. About 100 aids activists carried balloons and unfurled banners. They demanded President Bush do more to fight the AIDS epidemic. Police arrested 19 people. Elsewhere, veterans gathered in Union Square. They planned a candlelight vigil to coincide with the president's acceptance speech.

FOCUS VOICES FROM THE FLOOR

JIM LEHRER: Now the evening ahead for President Bush, the delegates, and the Republican Party. Ray Suarez has been talking to delegates about their expectations. Ray?

RAY SUAREZ: Well, Jim, at the risk of stating the obvious, Jim, there are few people in this room who would call themselves undecided. This party is united behind its nominee. But each delegate has his or her own ideas about what they'd like to hear in the president's speech, not only for themselves, but for the millions beyond Madison Square Garden who'll be watching.

DAVE BARTON, Texas: I think part of the assignment is to make people feel very comfortable and very stable. And I think he'll also give a greater vision than what we've heard in recent days. I think he'll really expand that vision, even in some of the cultural areas. One of the things that really concerns a lot of people is the culture. It's not just the economics, it's not just the military; those are key issues, but very few people vote only on one issue. So I think you'll see a much broader brush painted on what he believes America would look like culturally, militarily, economically, the jobs-- everything.

KAREN LIM-TUCKER, Texas: At this moment, the speech has to say that we're going to be safe; America is going to be safe. That is one of the most important issues right now, that we are addressing homeland security, terror and antiterrorism.

SHARONA REMILLIARD, North Carolina: Its just going to be a matter of us showing our true colors and showing who we are. I believe once folks know who we are as Republicans and see our platform, they'll join right in.

MATT McKEE: Well, he's a great president. He came through 9/11. He's helped us move ahead in America, and he's a good leader, and he has to keep telling people that he's the man we need for four more years, and he will continue to do the job, and a better job and we keep the terrorists and Iraq free people.

JACKIE McGOVERN: Well, I think he has to talk about the economy and what he intends to do to make a difference and to keep the economy growing, to bring jobs, to... I think health care is important to all of us and some of us are very fortunate to have it. There are those that aren't that fortunate and I think he has to address that. Talk about our future and what he intends to do for the future.

RAY SUAREZ: The president will have a big audience when he speaks. What is that an opportunity for him to do that maybe he doesn't get to do otherwise? Will he be able to reassure people, bring out new issues?

KEVIN MANNIX: Well, I think it's important for the president to reach out to those undecideds as well as perhaps people who started to tilt towards Sen. Kerry and to help them understand that the hate campaign out there has nothing to do with the reality of this presidency; that we all need to tone things down a bit and look at the positive vision he has for the future. Let's look at the fundamentals of the issues and let's look at the details as to how he's going to implement an agenda for the next four years.

NANCY SUHADOLNICK: I think terrorism is number one and the ability to know that he is the commander-in-chief and we need to be safe and he'll make sure we stay safe. And the economy is definitely an issue, especially in Cleveland, Ohio. It's rough.

RAY SUAREZ: What do you think the assignment is for him in such a close race?

MARK ANTHONY ILES: Well, I think the assignment for President Bush is real clear. It's the 21st century. He needs to clearly outline solutions for 21st century versus our opponents who are stuck in the 20th century. Two-party system, two Americas, which is what has become their theme, really goes back to problems that existed in the 20th century. Not that they've all gone away, but we're now the 21st century and we need new solutions for problems in the 21st century.

RAY SUAREZ: And campaign officials told us earlier today that a lot of what that California delegate was looking for will be in tonight's speech when the president accepts the nomination. He'll speak specifically about the programs and policies for the next four years on domestic issues, tax reform, health care, and economic security. Jim?

JIM LEHRER: Thank you, Ray. Some additional perspectives on what we might hear from the president, and to Gwen Ifill.

GWEN IFILL: And for that, I'm joined by two seasoned veterans of Republican campaigns. Clark judge served as speechwriter and special assistant to President Reagan and Vice President Bush. He's managing director of the White House Writers, a Washington communications firm. And Ken Khachigian was a speechwriter and political strategist on the last six Republican presidential campaigns. He's now an attorney and partner in a Los Angeles law firm. Gentlemen, we just heard the delegates on the floor talk about what the president has to do. They want to hear him talk about terrorism and keeping themselves safer. They want him to emphasize his leadership, talk about the economy and health care. What would you say, Ken Khachigian, if you were writing the speech for tonight, what would you have him say?

KEN KHACHIGIAN: Well, first of all, I'd put in the historical context. Every big speech is in historical context. In my view, the historical context is the president is a... there's an attempt really to destroy his presidency and him as a person. It's not just a matter of destroying his policies or his political party, but in the last six months to nine months there has been this effort to break his presidency. So I think he needs to show a lot of strength. The speech needs to attract itself to swing voters. But my definition of swing voters are people who don't want to die in terrorist attacks. So that's item number one, two, and three. He has to show strength in that area, make the case for the confusion and the America around the war in Iraq, largely fomented by questions raised by his political opponents. So this is an opportunity to have an unobstructed view of that.

GWEN IFILL: Clark Judge, an unobstructed view of the president's strengths?

CLARK JUDGE: Well, he has to do all that, of course. But elections are one-third about the past and two-thirds about the future. He needs to lay out where he wants to take the country in the next four years. Safety is part of it. But the party is engaged in the debate on safety over the last three nights and done it with extraordinary power and eloquence. It's been the best beginning... the best three nights of a convention I've ever seen. But he also needs to do something that no one else has done or could do, which is to lay out where he wants to take things -- not just in foreign but also in domestic policy. We hear about the economy being important, Governor Schwarzenegger addressed that. He needs now... the president needs now to say "what am I doing? Where am I going?" and do it in a way that captures the imagination of the public.

GWEN IFILL: Ken Khachigian, a big difference for an incumbent president seeking re-nomination than a challenger. We saw what John Kerry had to do in Boston last month, but for someone who wants to get the job again, it's a different task, isn't it?

KEN KHACHIGIAN: Yes, because he doesn't have to define himself this time. The question is not are we better off than we were four years ago? The question is will we be better off four years from now than we are now? That's what he has to focus on. To show you that Republicans don't always agree on everything I disagree a little bit with Clark. I do think he needs to lay out a bit of an agenda and some... a sense of the future, but I also think that political speeches like this cannot be state of the union speeches. He can't come out with some laundry list which is going to basically not focus in on the key thing that the country's looking for.

GWEN IFILL: Sounds like you don't really disagree.

KEN KHACHIGIAN: I agree with that. I'm not saying he needs to have forty programs, or even four. But he does need to give a sense of the values and the direction he wants to take the country.

CLARK JUDGE: I don't disagree with that.

GWEN IFILL: How much of the speech should be about war and terrorism and how much of those two things... can those two things be linked?

CLARK JUDGE: Well, I... war and terrorism are the same thing. The war in Iraq is part of the war on terror. We wouldn't be in Iraq now if it hadn't been for 9/11.

GWEN IFILL: You think that case has successfully been made?

CLARK JUDGE: I think it's been made with power and eloquence they didn't expect, starting with Senator McCain and Mayor Giuliani.

GWEN IFILL: So how much does the president have to talk about that?

CLARK JUDGE: I think that he does some, but I think he has got to give a sense of the future and particularly domestic future. I think we know where he wants to go in foreign policy. He needs to confirm that, give the sense of strength that Ken talked about. But he also needs to give a sense where he wants to go in domestic policy, too.

GWEN IFILL: 30 percent, 40 percent, 50 percent of the speech, Ken Khachigian?

KEN KHACHIGIAN: I think it's important for it to be the bulk of the speech, frankly. Iraq is on everyone's mind and this is a chance to put a big megaphone behind the positions that have been taken at the early days of this convention. Those will be long forgotten after the president gives his speech. And I think that if he doesn't make a very... look. The case for Iraq is the sense of America, what America does when confronted with massive movements like are taking place across the globe right now. This has to be put in that historical context, that this is not just about Saddam Hussein but also about what he represented.

GWEN IFILL: But people don't want to hear the president talk about domestic issues like Clark was saying?

KEN KHACHIGIAN: They do, of course they do. But the best platform for that is the greatest platform in America, which is the White House. I think again he needs to talk about his tax policies, a free society, hope and opportunity, education, things like that. But I don't think those should be the principal elements. That's not what's going to be taken out of this. People want to hear how we're going to extract ourselves from Iraq, why we're in Iraq, and what America's doing there.

CLARK JUDGE: He probably needs some thematic unity that ties it together so it's not this and that but its a total vision.He has an opportunity here, and the opportunity is a little bit surprising to me that we... that it's so clear. Sen. Kerry so clearly did not do that in Boston. So he left a huge vacuum. He left several huge vacuums that are being filled in right now. But that was one of the biggest. So if the president can, with thematic unity talk about the future and where he's taking the country both around the world and home, then he's going to fill that in and there's not going to be a lot of room for the democrats.

GWEN IFILL: Well, a tall order here. The president is scheduled to speak for something like fifty/fifty-five minutes tonight and he needs to talk about war and he needs to lay out his plan for the future and he needs to embrace some sort of grace notes in his speech. You write these things, or wrote these things for a living for people on stages like this. That's a pretty tall order.

KEN KHACHIGIAN: Sure. And it's very daunting, very frankly, when you're sitting looking at a blank page, and how to stuff this all in. But I think this particular speech can flow quite easily and at the very end, I think he also needs to leave an impression that there is a big difference between him and his opponent, John Kerry. Is John Kerry the war hero he was or is he an antiwar hero he was? It's the president who has a convincing compass versus this somebody guided by the political wins.

GWEN IFILL:: You think he needs to mention John Kerry by name?

KEN KHACHIGIAN: I would not be bothered by that if he did. Look, this is a tough election campaign. Harry Truman beat his opponents over the head in '48 because he was under fire. Presidents have to show toughness and strength.

GWEN IFILL: Clark Judge, how do you fill up that blank page?

CLARK JUDGE: I guess I feel it's an easier job than Ken feels... might feel it is. Look, he has a tremendously powerful record. He took an economy that was in freefall, he turned it around. He took one of the most dangerous and unappreciated foreign situations we've had in memory and turned... and has been turning that around. He's got an opponent who seems to be all over the map on what he wants to do on everything. He even flip-flops on whether he flip-flops. So he... you know, and he... and if the talk around town is right, he's also got a pretty arresting program to put out domestically. This is a strong hand to play. It's an extraordinarily strong hand to play. And if the past is any indication, this president and the people around him know how to play it very, very well.

GWEN IFILL: Clark Judge and Ken Khachigian, I'm sure you will be watching tonight. Thank you very much for joining us.

FOCUS NUMBER 41

JIM LEHRER: Earlier today here in New York I spoke with the president's father, George Herbert Walker Bush, the 41st president of the United States, about convention speeches, among other things.

JIM LEHRER: Mr. President, welcome.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Seems like old times, Jim.

JIM LEHRER: Yes, sir. Are there parallels between what your son faces now and what you faced for reelection in 1992?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I dont see real parallels. If there was one, its the economy. I thought our economy was good and failed to get the truth out to the American people. I think the economy today is basically pretty good, but I have every confidence that the presidents message about how the economy really is will more than offset the critics, so theres some parallel there, but in terms of national security theres no parallel at all, because 9/11 changed the world; it certainly changedour country.

JIM LEHRER: But in 92, you had done so well you were doing so well in the polls as the result of the first Gulf War and all of that, and then by the time the convention came, the election came, you werent doing so well because of the --

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I stopped doing so well not so many months after the war, and then when you got into the campaign, the Clinton campaign was very effective in saying foreign policy this is paraphrasing doesnt matter -- what does is the economy its the economy, stupid and they got in the crosshairs and you know, they in turn made out like the economy was horrible and it wasnt so they did a very good job on that, but the war was over, and I say successfully, and we did what we said we were going to do, but people have forgotten that; maybe we should have raised it more, I dont know.

JIM LEHRER: The president, of course, is going to make his speech tonight. Your speech that you made in 1992, do you have any memories of whether that that you were effective or ineffective or anything

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I have no memories. My problem is, Jim, Im getting older and I know if you asked what was your good line or what was the essence of the speech about, I could not tell you, and I am not trying to avoid the question.

JIM LEHRER: Sure.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I dont know and just dont remember. Thats why I dont go around doing a lot of interviews.

JIM LEHRER: Sure. Theres a story in the New York Times this morning about re-nomination speeches, and let me read you this paragraph, because its about you. It says, quote, well, it was a mistake to go along with the Democratic tax increase President George H.W. Bush declared in 1992, offering up a mea culpa, rare for any president, quote, and I admit it, end quote. Do you remember saying that?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: No. But I remember saying no taxes and then having had to in my view make a compromise to control spending and taxes, and thats just I remember that from 1988, and I do remember that.

JIM LEHRER: That was the Read My Lips speech.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Yes. I wish like hell I had never said that because they could focus on the quote, rather than on how the economy was, and, you know, that hurt me, I think.

JIM LEHRER: Yeah. Is the you dont think your son is facing a similar kind of situation in what hes got to

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I think hes faced with attacks that are similar, a bunch of Democrats running around saying the economy is lousy, and they got to -- our side has to answer them effectively, but I think they have and are and I think the economy is clearly further along now than it was in 92, even though the growth in 92 was, you know, 5 percent in the last quarter. But I think I think theyve got a more effective communications team and better to get the message out. I think our president does.

JIM LEHRER: Do you agree with the pundits who say really isnt the economy; its going to be the Iraq War thats going to decide this election?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Well, Ive always felt that the economy is what determines elections, but that was pre-9/11, so I guess Id have to say, I dont know, I dont know whether I agree with them or not.

JIM LEHRER: Yeah.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Because I dont know the answer; I dont know the bottom line, but I think -- put it this way: if the economy, if the American people see the economy not as better, but as strong as it is, I think the president will breeze to victory.

But I think that 9/11 made post 9/11 makes terrorism, homeland security, and all of these issues that I didnt even have to contend with, and so I think foreign policy, war, national security are more important ingredients than they were back when I was running.

JIM LEHRER: Why do you think the country is so divided over the Iraq military action?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I dont know. I honestly dont know. We had divisions when we had to go to war in 1992, the Congress voted to give me the right to use whatever means were necessary to get Saddam Hussein out, and that was a party line vote. We forget that. George Mitchell and Kerry and all these people voted against that, and they viewed oh, let sanctions work longer, well delay this, and they had, you know, rationale afterwards. To their credit, when the war started, you know, we support our troops kind of thing. I remember that very distinctly, and I think thats somewhat different than then, but they made it a partisan vote. And I think a lot of the attacks on the president are partisan attacks.

But, frankly, very few people are saying, stop, bring the troops home, very few are saying that, and I dont think its a partisan thing.

JIM LEHRER: Yeah. But the public opinion polls show the American people divided almost 50/50 on the issue

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: On Bush/Kerry?

JIM LEHRER: No, No. No, No. On the issue of whether or not it was -- we were justified in taking preemptive action in going into Iraq in the first place.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Yeah, thats true, but were there. You know what Id like to do. Id like to ask those on the other side: Do you think were better off with the status quo? Do you think we were better off, or the Iraqi people were better off when Saddam Hussein was in office? Do you really think thats what we ought to have? And I went to do a show yesterday and I said you know, somebody ought to ask this awful Michael Moore, this you know who Im talking about -- moveon.org

JIM LEHRER: Right.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: -- horrible guy and ought ask him so they went and asked him and he kind of hedged around; he didnt say, no, we ought to have Saddam Hussein back. So if I think you phrased the question that way, theres plenty of support for the president, but if, you know, are you troubled by the way things are; there are these divisions.

JIM LEHRER: You know, Mr. President, conventional wisdom is that you would never have taken preemptive action in a situation that existed before Iraq if you had been president under the same situation. Is that conventional wisdom correct?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: No, because I think I said back then Id have to look at it I know I remember telling, I think it was Danny Inoue and he came to see me

JIM LEHRER: The senator from Hawaii.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Yes. And he told me he couldnt vote with me on this resolution and that I said was really a battle and I said, well, Dan, I might have to do this anyway. I feel so strongly about the moral equation here that I would use force even if the Congress did not back me on this. So I think I hope my recollection is correct and I think it is so I believe I would have done what you asked about.

JIM LEHRER: Okay. So its not inconsistent with the way you thought or think about things.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: No.

JIM LEHRER: Or thought about things as president.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: No. We tried to put together a coalition, which we did. We tried to get the Congress support, which eventually we did. But if we hadnt had it, I think we would have had to do it.

JIM LEHRER: You know, Mr. President, theres an awful lot of people who say its just kind of common terminology, Bush I, Bush II. In other words, youre Bush I in terms of the Bush administration; your son is now Bush II. And some people say its an extension of the same presidency. Should people see it that way at all?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: As an extension?

JIM LEHRER: Kind of an extension of the same

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: No, I dont see it any more than it is an extension of the, you know, Ronald Reagan presidency. I think each president is an individual, his own convictions, his own emphasis, his own courage or his own style of leadership. So I dont think its an extension. I can see why people might say that, but that implies to me, Jim, an extension of the presidency this is kind of a master plan the old guy did this, and now the son is doing that. No such thing.

JIM LEHRER: And you dont see it that way at all?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: No.

JIM LEHRER: Heres your son in the same job, same incredible job, and extending your kind of way of doing things, you dont see that at all?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: No. I think hell do it his own way, and sometimes I might do it differently or sometimes I might not, but if I were going to say I might have done it differently or might do something in the future different, I wouldnt discuss it. I had my chance, and now just get out of the way and be there as a father, and sometimes, Jim, its not easy, but Im so much in agreement with what the presidents doing and has done, but its not as difficult as you might think.

JIM LEHRER: You mean sometimes it is difficult to get out of the way and not say

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Well, sometimes you might you almost feel irrelevant you know, I was president but I dont do the op/ed pieces; I havent been on your show I think since George was or maybe I was but I dont think so and its that kind of thing. I dont seek out

JIM LEHRER: We were talking about your book, when your book came out.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Yes. And so Im not a legacy kind of guy Im not Im a father and with some experience, did some things right, screwed up a couple of things, but I had my shot, and now its to support the president, and if I had a nuance of difference, and I said it right here, every guy with a little notebook out there would look what he said on Lehrer -- and go around ask some guy in the White House, look what the nutty father said now; what do you think and I dont want to complicate the life of the president.

JIM LEHRER: One last question, Mr. President. Vietnam has come up as an issue in this campaign.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Yes.

JIM LEHRER: Is that legitimate?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I tell you whats profound in my book, and I was one who when I was a congressman supported President Johnson in all of this but I think the focus that seems to be coming up now as to whether John Kerry was right speaking from his heart, Im sure in condemning the war in the way in which he did, impugning the, I think, impugning the integrity and the honor of those who were still serving, and those with whom he did serve, I think that is a very legitimate thing that must be answered.

I remember Jane Fonda. And I try to be a forgiving guy, and Jane Fonda I think has apologized for the abuse that she brought upon these prisoners, and I saw her once at a White House party a British embassy deal where the queen was giving a return party for Barbara and me, and she wanted the queen wanted Jane Fonda there with Turner.

JIM LEHRER: Ted Turner, who was her husband at the time, right.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Yeah. And I said I dont want my picture taken with Jane Fonda, and I expect she wouldnt want hers taken with me, but I dont want to make every veteran in the United States furious.

So we had a receiving line, the press were elbowed out of the way, and in a very diplomatic way, the way the Brits would do it and she came through the line looking great, and she said to me, Mr. President, I know this is very, very difficult for you. And I said, well, I know its difficult for you, Jane, and I appreciate it, and on she went and that was the last word I spoke to her.

She apologized, and I in my heart still cannot forgive her. And Im not proud of that. So I feel very strongly about the comments of those who came back and then in brutal -- and then by the strength of their words brutalized people that were still serving or who had served.

And one of the things about Desert Storm is the way the war ended that you see the Vietnam veterans marching with the Desert Storm veterans, and I just felt a great sense of joy emotional I was emotional when I saw it, saying, theyre getting their just due at last.

JIM LEHRER: But thats different than John Kerrys service overseas, right?

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: Well, I dont know that its different because he came back and said people were gouging eyes out, and I dont want to misquote the man, but theres some stuff flashing on the television this morning in quotes and if theyre not accurate, they ought to be they ought to be condemned. But it looks to me like they are accurate.

JIM LEHRER: Mr. President, thank you very much.

FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: You got it.

FOCUS LASTING IMPRESSIONS

JIM LEHRER: Now a general look at the history of nomination acceptance speeches, and to Margaret Warner.

MARGARET WARNER: What does history say about what makes a great re-nominating acceptance speech, or one a president or his campaign may come to regret?

For that, we turn to presidential historian Michael Beschloss; Richard Norton Smith, director of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library; and Meena Bose, a professor of American politics at West Point. Welcome back to you all.

The New York Times, Richard, this morning said that only one president in the 20th century had "pulled it off." which was give a re-nominating speech that made a lasting impression. And they were speaking of FDR in 1936. Are they right?

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: You know, maybe in terms of sheer eloquence. We quote that speech; we don't quote many other speeches. But that year FDR could have read the phone book and he would have carried every state but Maine and Vermont. Harry Truman is, I would say, the president in the 20th century who wrote the book about how, trailing going into a defeatist political environment, seizing the initiative. Remember, the incumbent has one advantage-- they always go second. And the other advantage is, they're an incumbent. A president can scramble the playing field and that's what Harry Truman did. He didn't run against Tom Dewey, his nominal opponent, he ran against the so-called do-nothing 80th Congress. He said he was going to call them into session on what they called Turnip Day back in Missouri. He put the ball in their court knowing Congress would not adopt the liberal platform and then driving a wedge right down the middle between Dewey and his allies.

MARGARET WARNER: Is that the way we should look at these speeches, Michael, not that they'll make a lasting impression that historians will quote but whether they dothe political job?

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: Whether they work. As you will well remember, eight years ago tonight you and I were in Chicago for the NewsHour when Bill Clinton gave his acceptance speech accepting a second term. It was 66 minutes, one of the most boring speeches I have ever heard, something that was shared by everyone on the panel and I went back to the transcript, we all thought it was dreadful. And I remember going out of the sky box like this, ran into a Clinton aide, said "How'd you like the speech?" I said "was it really necessary to go through this laundry list of proposals like cleaning up toxic waste dumps, it wasn't very interesting." He said "the speech wasn't for you. What we did was this, we wrote the speech assuming that people might tune in for a couple minutes then tune into the ball game. During those two or three minutes we wanted them to hear three or four proposals that they might like that might bind them to Clinton, get them to vote for Clinton" and the speech worked in that sense.

MARGARET WARNER: You're talking about his first shot at it, not the re-nomination?

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: No, I'm talking about '96.

MARGARET WARNER: Sorry, my math is fuzzy.

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: It increased his margin over Bob Dole.

MARGARET WARNER: Meena, would you like to give an example of another one that was successful, or should we shift to ones that have been unsuccessful.

MEENA BOSE: I think the successful ones are more interesting, obviously, the positive stories. I would echo what Richard was saying about Truman in '48. Even though Truman wasn't up for reelection, per se, he hadn't run for president before, but that was an important example of a president who was not just celebrating what he had done and not just emphasizing continuation but throwing down a challenge. And Eisenhower would be another good example in '56. Now Eisenhower didn't have the same divided party that Truman had in '48. Truman had critics from the left and right and people walking out of the convention and forming their own conventions, the Strom Thurmond supporters and Henry Wallace. But Eisenhower talked about nuclear weapons and said in this era of thermonuclear weapons, war would be preposterous.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Go to an example, Richard, of one that failed to do the job.

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: 1992 and the first President Bush. Remember, these things take place within a context and there was a feeling, whatever the statistics might say, that the economy was in the doldrums and in some ways the president's great strength, foreign policy, had been turned against him because it was believed that he was really December engaged from domestic policy. It had been a negative kind of convention. All of... the whole burden was on his shoulders and he really needed to hit one out of the park. Instead, he got up there and he had a speech that frankly was a bit of a mishmash, not very thematically coherent, the one thing people remember was it contained an apology for the tax increase that he had gone along with in 1990 as part of the budget.

MARGARET WARNER: And Jim mentioned to him in the interview today.

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: I'm not surprised he doesn't remember it. He probably doesn't want to remember it.

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: He's repressed things.

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: Yeah. It didn't help the cause.

MARGARET WARNER: What about the challenges of wartime incumbents? I think we can even throw Hubert Humphrey into that mix because he was a sitting vice president. What have been... what are the special challenges? Who's done it well and how?

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: Well, it's when... actually, this is something that's not un-germane tonight. It's when you near a time of war and a president uses that stature to make himself popular in a way that he might not otherwise be. Richard Nixon in 1972 was still fighting the Vietnam War and also the Cold War. And the language was not memorable, but what he was conveying was with the I'm the guy who made the opening to China, who was doing diplomacy with Russia, on the verge of ending the Vietnam War. If you all want to throw that away, fine with me but I don't think you should."

MARGARET WARNER: In other words, he was painting McGovern as unfit to lead in the time of war.

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: Without mentioning the name of McGovern. And one interesting thing he said at the beginning, he talked about his vice president, Spiro Agnew just after McGovern had thrown Eagleton the off the ticket. Nixon said about Agnew "I won't change my mind tomorrow." Of course, the next year Agnew quit after corruption charges.

MARGARET WARNER: You've heard in Gwen's earlier segment, Meena, that there was a discussion about how much George Bush, this George Bush, should talk about domestic issues being that it was a time of war. Again, historically, what have wartime presidents done? Have they played up the wartime aspect or have they also attended to the economic and domestic concerns?

MEENA BOSE: Well, they certainly can't ignore the domestic issues, but I think what Michael was just saying is the importance of actions over words, so they emphasize what they've done already -- the accomplishments they've had in office, be it during the Cold War, detente, or moving forward in the Vietnam War, peace talks, and then what's to come ahead. So domestic policy is really secondary, I would say. And the primary focus is on the importance of the president leading the foreign policy agenda.

MARGARET WARNER: What would you say about wartime?

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: It's interesting. If you look at 1944, there was this perception on the part of many that if the voters thought the war would be over soon, they might vote for the challenger, Tom Dewey. Whereas FDR --

MARGARET WARNER: Really?

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: Churchill the next year.

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: A tired old man. So FDR --

MARGARET WARNER: We don't need him so we can switch?

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: We have the luxury of making the change. FDR gave a war speech. He didn't speak at the convention hall. It was announced he was speaking from an undisclosed location. A military installation on the West Coast.

MARGARET WARNER: That's another rich tradition.

RICHARD NORTON SMITH: Exactly.

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: But, you know, the one thing is that if a wartime president makes himself seem indispensable he can get Americans to vote for him even if they may not like his domestic policies. I think we're going to see that to want.

MARGARET WARNER: And we've heard that theme already from other convention speakers.

MICHAEL BESCHLOSS: Absolutely.

MARGARET WARNER: Michael, Richard, Meena, thanks. We'll see you later.

FOCUS SHIELDS & BROOKS

JIM LEHRER: And we have arrived once again at the analysis of Shields and Brooks: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields, New York Times columnist David Brooks. Just picking up on what Michael just said, Michael says we're probably going to see tonight a wartime president establishing the fact that you must keep me because we are at war. Do you agree with that? That's probably going to be....

MARK SHIELDS: That would be an attempt. I think that's certainly a message of this convention. I mean, it was Dick Cheney talking about Rudy Giuliani thanking God that George Bush was president on Sept. 11, in his testimony to his police commissioner was that the vice president last night... it was John McCain making the case for the war. I mean, it was that this man is a strong stalwart leader. And it... it's intriguing to me that that has been the... it's come back over and over again in spite of the moderate face we talked about to that.

JIM LEHRER: Now, David, you've said repeatedly this week that the president's got to do more than that, you think he needs to go forward in other areas. Explain. He's probably listening and he's probably still got time to rewrite, so what do you think?

DAVID BROOKS: I know he's probably thinking the way I am, great minds think alike; at least mediocre minds. Yeah, I absolutely do. He's going to be a war president I'm told he's looked at the 1944 Roosevelt speeches to see how he explained himself. But I really think domestic policy has to play a major role. In distinction to what Clark and Ken were saying, I think he has to get a little wonky. Here's a couple reasons why: First, as I mentioned last night when we were talking to Karl Rove, when we were leaving in Boston we saw the big democratic honchos after the Kerry speech and they were ebullient because they thought it had been a great convention. But the mood that you set at a convention fades away after the few weeks. But the policies that you recommend, that's something people can latch on to. I think it's extremely important for this president to get a little wonkier than the speech writers want to get for a number of reasons. First, that's a vacuum. We don't know what he's doing to do. He's got to fill in that vacuum in the way John Kerry did not fill in the vacuum in Boston. Second, things are going to happen. The next day on Friday there are going to be job numbers. If the job numbers are bad or any other problem comes up, he's got to be able to say "I already have a plan to deal with this, I talked about it in New York." So he needs to get a little wonkier than we need from a re-nominating speech and also from a war speech.

JIM LEHRER: Does that make sense to you?

MARK SHIELDS: Shields: It makes sense to me, Jim. But the president is in a different position than he was in Philadelphia four years ago. Then we had cascading budget surpluses. We had an economy that would... people felt the country was headed in the right direction economically. So he could stand up there in 2000 and be a new Republican, a moderate Republican and say... you know, change the entire platform by saying "we're not going to abolish the Department of Energy or the Department of Education. In fact, we're going to keep the National Endowment for the Arts, National Endowment for the Humanities. We're going to expand medical research and diseases that afflict women in particular." He doesn't have that kind of latitude on spending in 2004 that he had in 2000. So I think his initiatives are limited more into the tax area, you know, call it the Ownership Society or whatever bad phrase they've come up with. They ought to have a better advertising agency; that's not a grabber. And, you know, I think the real big initiatives.

JIM LEHRER: When you say wonky, David, what do you mean? You're not talking about the same thing Mark is talking about?

DAVID BROOKS: It should be the lease-to- ownership society. No, I really... do... Bill Clinton gave a wonky speech. His state of the union speeches were like that; I thinkthis should be more than a state of the union speech. And I agree with Mark that the money the not there. So it restrains you.

JIM LEHRER: So what does he do?

DAVID BROOKS: I think there are a number of things he can do. One on tax reform. He can talk about simplifying the tax code in a way that's revenue neutral that doesn't cost you money. But the big thing is entitlement reform. You are not a major party, an intellectually serious party unless you can talk about entitlements.

JIM LEHRER: Social Security, Medicare? And Alan Greenspan has said if you don't do it soon, this whole thing is going to collapse.

DAVID BROOKS: Alan Greenspan? Pete Peterson, everybody who knows anything about this subject; and they have said nothing about that. So what he these say is I'm going to reform in the some significant way, and he can't just say that, he has to show you the direction. And I think what he's going to do is say "I'm not Barry Goldwater. I'm not a libertarian type who wants to get rid of government. I believe in using government in a positive way and here's how I'm going to do it."

JIM LEHRER: Mark, whatever he says, is the target audience for him tonight... not talking about past presidents and past speeches, but this president on this particular night. Is he... is his base already energized? Can he forget about the people in the hall and just talk to the other folks out in television land?

MARK SHIELDS: I would say that, Jim, but, I mean, this convention has been about energizing the base. I mean, make no mistake about it. I mean, John McCain, we talked about Rudy Giuliani, talked about John McCain speaking and moderate faces and so forth. But those speeches last night, I mean, Zell Miller who made Pat Buchanan sound namby-pamby, and Dick Cheney, those were base speeches.

JIM LEHRER: You don't think they were designed to turn people off?

MARK SHIELDS: To get to the undecided voters in upper Darby, Pennsylvania? No, I think they were there to energize Republicans and Bush supporters. And I think you can say the Democrats... each one is going to be successful, we'll know in November. The Democrats was all about a rush to the middle. I mean, you know, they would say "what happened to the Democratic left is they were kind of left out of the whole thing." The most intriguing observation that was made in the entire show tonight was made by my old friend Ken Khachigian. I've known him for a long time and I have great respect and affection for him, and he gave the most ingenious formulation. He said this is... the question is not are we better off than we were four years ago but are we better off four years from now? Which is an intriguing question for an incumbent to ask and it comes back to what David is saying. He better have something about the future because absent that, absent something really riveting about the future, then you are left to the question: Are we better off than we were four years ago? And all you can say is we're safer, and we're safer because of George Bush.

DAVID BROOKS: I'm sure there's a campaign about the middle. I mean... or that they're ignoring for the middle and going for the base. They're trying to show that John Kerry is a flip-flopper. That's the core we've had up to now. That's why I think domestic policy will play a little less role... or a little greater role than you might expect. Because if there's anything that Bush and the whole Republican Party have been clear about since Sept. 20, 2001, it's the war on terror and what they want to do about that. I'm sure he'll restate it all in stirring terms but I think he has to full in the domestic policy void.

JIM LEHRER: One other thing before we go, we can pick up on this later during the convention itself, but what former President Bush said in that interview plus what Karl Rove said sitting here last night, it's clear that the Bush campaign has decided to go full blast against Kerry on the second part of the Vietnam thing, that what he said in 1971 etc. That's become... that is rote now, is it not?

DAVID BROOKS: Yeah, they must have shown that it works. One of the speeches they've looked at is this 1944 Roosevelt speech and Roosevelt goes after the Republicans by comparing them to "Mein Kampf." When you're a war president you can be a little tougher, and they've decided this Vietnam issues works well for them.

JIM LEHRER: You agree

MARK SHIELDS: I was astounded by President Bush, such a gentleman, a man who always... really, had friends across the aisle. I'm not talking about phony friends or window dressing friends. Danny Rostenkowski, the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee is his personal friend. That Jane Fonda anecdote, that was right out of Karl Rove's playbook. I mean, that was generated. That was not...

JIM LEHRER: Clearly they believe it's working.

MARK SHIELDS: That's what I mean. Now to put the president on and have him drop that little bomb --

JIM LEHRER: And Rove picked up on it with great enthusiasm last night.

MARK SHIELDS: Enthusiasm, high profile, close identification with the issue.

JIM LEHRER: We will continue this later, gentlemen. Thank you.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: Before we go now, the other non-convention news of this day. Militants holding hundreds of hostages in a Russian school released more than two dozen women and children. The group stormed the building yesterday, near the troubled region of Chechnya. We have a report from Julian Manyon of Independent Television News.

JULIAN MANYON: At the nearest point they can get to the school, anxious parents suddenly hear explosions... ( bomb exploding ) something is happening out of sight 150 yards away, but no-one can tell them what it is, and inevitably some fear the worst. Smoke rises, but no information comes from the Russian army. For some, the tension and despair are simply too much to bear. Officials who appear are besieged with questions and pleas-- these parents beg to be allowed to take the place of their children. "We've already offered that," the man replied, "and the terrorists refused." There was just a glimmer of hope today. It came as a soldier carried a small child to safety; 26 people, including adults and several of the youngest children, were released. The children were naked, their clothes apparently too soiled to wear, leading some to fear that conditions inside the school are deteriorating fast. Tonight, Russian troops appear to be moving forward into combat positions as the stakes get ever higher. The lives of many innocents, as well as the reputation of Russia itself, depend on the actions they now take.

JIM LEHRER: No group has claimed responsibility for the attack on the school, but the militants have demanded the authorities release other fighters now held in Russian jails. A U.N. envoy today urged Sudan to accept a larger international force in the Darfur region. Arab militias there have killed some 50,000 black villagers, and forced more than a million others to flee. Today, the envoy told the U.N. Security Council that Sudan has not handled the problem on its own.

JAN PRONK: No concrete steps have been taken to bring to justice or even identify any of the militia leaders or perpetrators of these attacks, allowing violations of human rights to continue in a climate of impunity.

JIM LEHRER: Sudan's foreign minister criticized the U.N. report. He said it overlooked progress in Darfur. But the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. called for tougher measures against Sudan. John Danforth said the Security Council could not rely on the Sudanese government to protect the people of Darfur. In northern Iraq today, police found the bodies of two Turks and an unidentified man. That came as al-Jazeera Television reported it had a video of three Turkish hostages being killed. The kidnappers are linked to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian militant.

Back in this country, prosecutors in Colorado have dropped a sexual assault case against pro basketball star Kobe Bryant. They announced last night the alleged victim no longer wants to pursue the case. Bryant admitted to having sex with the woman, but claimed it was consensual. He still faces a civil suit for damages. On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained more than 121 points to close at 10,290. The NASDAQ rose 23 points to close at 1,873. We'll see you again at 8:00 P.M. Eastern Time with our live coverage of the Republican Convention here in New York; then again here at our regular NewsHour time tomorrow evening. We also have further convention coverage online. For now, I'm Jim Lehrer, thank you and good night.