The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight: Our summary of the news; then the Super Tuesday impact on campaign 2004: The John Kerry success, the John Edwards run; plus, some Bush-Cheney TV ads; and a look ahead with Mark Shields and David Brooks, among others. Then, a same-sex marriage update report, and some perspective on today's big Disney meeting in Philadelphia.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: John Kerry had clear sailing toward the Democratic presidential nomination today. He scored a near-sweep in the ten Super Tuesday primaries, forcing John Edwards, his last major opponent, from the race. Kerry lost only Vermont, to favorite son and former Governor Howard Dean. Dean dropped out of the race two weeks ago. Altogether, Kerry has won 27 of 30 state races and now has 1,100 delegates. That's more than half the number he needs to win the official nomination. Edwards formally ended his campaign today at a Raleigh, North Carolina, high school once attended by his late son. He told supporters he was delighted he'd gotten as far as he had, and he gave his full support to John Kerry.

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS: Today, I've decided to suspend my campaign for the presidency of the United States. But I want to say a word about a man who is a friend of mine, somebody who I believe has great strength and great courage, my friend Senator John Kerry, somebody who has fought for and will continue to fight for the things that all of us believe in.

JIM LEHRER: Edwards finished with only one primary win, in South Carolina, the state where he was born. Also in yesterday's California primary, voters approved a $15 billion bond issue to relieve the state's huge debt. President Bush launched a two-day campaign swing through California today. He hosted a conference in Los Angeles to discuss his faith- based initiatives. The first television ads of the Bush-Cheney campaign will begin to air during the president's trip. Four spots will start tomorrow in more than a dozen states. We'll have more on them later in the program. Iraqi officials said the death toll rose to 271 today from suicide attacks against Shiites in Baghdad and Karbala yesterday. We have a report from Julian Manyon of Independent Television News. (Chanting)

JULIAN MANYON: In Baghdad they brought out the bodies soon after dawn, as three days of mourning began around the shrine where so many worshipers died. Further south in the holy city of Karbala, thousands flooded into the streets to see the procession of coffins on its way. Yesterday in Karbala, a pilgrim took these pictures of the terrible moment when the bombs started going off. This was the softest of soft targets-- innocent people killed and maimed as part of a strategy of terror designed to reduce Iraq to anarchy.

MUWAFFAK AL-RUABIE: This is a true terrorism, because it's indiscriminate killing against innocent civilians.

JULIAN MANYON: Today the Shiite militias were out in force at the scene of the Baghdad bombings, very publicly taking charge of security. Inside the cordons, crowds of angry young men blaming the coalition for yesterday's disaster and cursing the American helicopters overhead. Nearby, American troops stood guard at their base shoulder to shoulder with members of the new Iraqi army, but that didn't stop some of the Shiites from taunting the American soldiers.

JIM LEHRER: The head of U.S. forces in the region told Congress today there was "no doubt" Jordanian al-Qaida suspect Abu Musab al- Zarqawi was behind the attacks. Army general John Abizaid testified in Washington before the house armed services committee.

GEN. JOHN ABIZAID: We have intelligence that ties him to this attack. We have intelligence that shows that there is some linkage between and the former regime elements, specifically the Iraqi intelligence service.

JIM LEHRER: We'll have an interview with General Abizaid tomorrow night. U.S. Administrator Paul Bremer told reporters in Baghdad it was "increasingly apparent" much of the terrorism comes from outside Iraq. He pledged to beef up border security to keep foreign fighters out. A leader of Haiti's rebels today pledged to disarm his forces and pull them off the streets. Guy Filipe said they could stand down, now that "there are foreign troops promising to protect the Haitian people." One thousand U.S. Marines are now in the country, some patrolling the streets of the capital, port-au- prince. Some 1,000 U.S. Troops are now in the country. More than 400 French troops are expected to be there by the end of the week. But members of the 15-nation Caribbean community said they'd withhold any troops pending an inquiry into the circumstances of former-President Aristide's exile. Aristide has alleged U.S. troops forced him to leave against his will. Secretary of State Powell, among others, has denied that. Gay marriages spanned the country today. In Portland, Oregon, a county official issued some 25 same-sex couples marriage licenses, who were then married by a county judge. In New York, the mayor of Nyack said he'd begin marrying same- sex couples, including his own same-sex partner. The mayor of the first New York town to marry gay couples now faces criminal charges for his actions. And in Washington, D.C., Senate Majority Leader Frist warned gay marriages could spread like wildfire unless there's a constitutional amendment banning it. We'll have more on this story later in the program. More than 40 percent of the shareholders of the Walt Disney company today expressed disapproval of Michael Eisner's leadership. They withheld their support for the chairman-CEO in a vote at the company's annual investors meeting in Philadelphia. Two former board members called for Eisner's immediate ouster, blaming him for a decline in stock value. Eisner's job is not in jeopardy now, since his reelection to the board of directors is unopposed. We'll have more on the Disney story later in the program. On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained just over a point to close at 10593. The NASDAQ fell six points to close at 2033. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to: A multi-part examination of where the race for president stands this day after Super Tuesday; plus, the mushrooming same-sex marriage story; and the wars over Disney.

FOCUS - CAMPAIGN 2004

JIM LEHRER: Today in the 2004 campaign for president, the day after Super Tuesday, we begin with the story of the winner, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, and to Gwen Ifill.

GWEN IFILL: Kerry's near-clean Super Tuesday sweep made him the Democrats' presumptive nominee and set up an eight-month challenge to President George W. Bush. He spent last night and today rallying his troops and preparing for the campaign's next phase.

SEN. JOHN KERRY: Tonight, the message could not be clearer all across our country: Change is coming to America. (Cheers and applause) Before us lie long months of effort and of challenge, and we understand that. We have no illusions about the Republican attack machine and what our opponents have done in the past and what they may try to do in the future. But I know that together we are equal to this task. I am a fighter! (Cheers and applause)

GWEN IFILL: Kerry also thanked his most loyal supporters.

SEN. JOHN KERRY: To all of those in public life who took risks, joined this campaign early, hung in when it was tough and stayed with us today, and to all those who have joined recently, this is not a campaign that will measure who and when; it is a campaign that will measure what we have to achieve together over the course of these next months. (Cheers and applause)

GWEN IFILL: At a town hall meeting in Orlando, Florida, this afternoon, Kerry shifted his energies to the general election campaign to come against President Bush.

SEN. JOHN KERRY: We need to change the way we are thinking. I think there are reasonable Republicans out there who know that there's nothing conservative or mainstream Republican about what George Bush is doing with the deficits of this country. There's nothing conservative or mainstream Republican about letting your attorney general abuse civil rights so that the inspector general twice criticizes him for it. George Bush has about $200 million, and he's going to start advertising tomorrow. We need to be able to answer him. And I am able now to raise money, because Howard Dean and I both went outside of the system, so we're permitted to go out and raise money. We need to get Democrats all across this country, independents, Republicans who want change, go to johnkerry.Com.

GWEN IFILL: Kerry's lock on the Democratic nomination was not always foreseen. His campaign seesawed from early favorite to dead in the water to surprise Iowa comeback, just as voters in subsequent primary states began paying attention. We're joined by two of the reporters who've gotten dizzy on that seesaw: Glen Johnson, of the "Boston Globe," who has covered Kerry since his 1996 Senate reelection campaign, and Jeff Zeleny of the "Chicago Tribune."

So, Glen Johnson, how did John Kerry pull this out?

GLEN JOHNSON: The way he always does. He comes from behind and ends up ahead at the most important time which is when the voting actually occurs. He took a campaign that in the beginning built off the front-runner's momentum that he had, focus on the resume, built a good staff, then was swamped by the tide of interest in Howard Dean and through the summer and into the fall, tried to fight back from that, and ended up focusing all his attention on Iowa and then employed the strategy that Howard Dean had actually hoped to employ which was to do well in Iowa, vault out of Iowa into New Hampshire and flip off the diving board into all the other states to come afterwards. And it's just momentum has helped to get momentum in this race. He has succeeded because of that.

GWEN IFILL: Jeff, does his temporary underdog status when he was struggling to be heard at the end of the year, did it help him in the end?

JEFF ZELENY: It absolutely did. You could see him in the summer months when the crowds were small, when he was attracting far fewer than Howard Dean and Richard Gephardt and even John Edwards. He made a concerted effort to focus on one place. That place was going to be Iowa. The first time I saw his new hunger for this was back on Nov. 15 when he was giving a speech at the Jefferson Jackson Day dinner in Des Moines. He came out with a very impassioned response. It was more aggressive than we had seen up to that point and he started saying bring it on. He meant exactly that. Well, he was talking about the president at the time. In a sense, he was also speaking to the democrats in the room, specifically Howard Dean. So him being the come-from-behind winner, the underdog was key for the next two months until he finally won Iowa.

GWEN IFILL: After he won Iowa and started doing well, he seemed allergic, Glen, to the term front-runner. I wonder if that wasn't a mind game he needed in order to stay focus as well.

GLEN JOHNSON: He is always very cautious about phraseology like that. Front-runner, he was almost radioactive any time he was asked about who his running mate would be. I think part of his superstition, he doesn't want to get ahead of himself, but he has been very cautious throughout his career to take this thing one step at a time. I remember last year or maybe it was the year before when he was about to run for reelection, I had traveled with him for a year and a half while he was getting ready for president. He still wasn't even conceding he would run for president. He has been cautious about going about these things one step at a time. He got to a place nobody else was going to get to, which is everybody is out of the race now and he is the likely person to have the nomination. It wasn't pretty in the getting there but he got to where he wanted to be.

GWEN IFILL: It was also critical at a key point that he had the money to be able to hang in there, isn't it - the big loan that he took out against his own house?

JEFF ZELENY: It absolutely was. He decided in December that he was going to risk it all, in a sense. He needed money. Some of his fund-raisers I would speak to privately were sort of discussing how they could gently leave the campaign. Most of them decided to hang in there until it was over. They thought it might be a month away. So he mortgaged, put a second mortgage on one of his homes and it absolutely paid off. One of the times that you could sort of see his real hunger for this was on New Year's Eve when he spent it in Sioux City, Iowa and people came to one of his events and all of his rivals were off doing other things. And I thought that really showed and it showed to Iowans that I spoke to that he was really committed to this race.

GWEN IFILL: Only in Iowa would New Year's Eve with John Kerry sound like a good idea.

JEFF ZELENY: Indeed.

GWEN IFILL: What was John Kerry's lowest point in the roller coaster period, Glen?

GLEN JOHNSON: I'd have to think it was - even his announcement day, December 3, I think it was, he did an elaborate run-up to announcing that day. He appeared on Meet the Press. He went down to South Carolina and stood in front of the U.S.S. Yorktown and did his the announcement. And then he flew off to Des Moines and he was asked at an ice cream stand there whether or not he was considering any staff shakeup. He acknowledged he was, wasn't ruling it out. All of a sudden the whole story turned from not his announcement tour but his decision to shake up his staff. And this whole imagery they worked months to prepare and try to evoke just fell by the way side. So I think from that point on into the fall, it was a very, very low period for him. He just could not seem to catch a break. People were abandoning the campaign and the once front-runner, all the stories were about why he was no longer the front-runner.

GWEN IFILL: We had done a story like that. I may have done a story like that. Jeff, however, at some point the conventional wisdom became that he was a much better candidate and began to focus. Was it that John Kerry became a better candidate or votersbegan to look for something different?

JEFF ZELENY: I think it is a mix of both, actually. He was trying harder and he was taking every question from every last voter. He was staying at events in New Hampshire and Iowa for hours on end. I think he was becoming a better candidate in a sense. His answers were shorter. They weren't the long-winded 15-minute answer to the questions that we heard for a year or so. For a time he became a better candidate. I was out with him last week in a plant in Struthers, Ohio, a steel plant. These were average working class people asking questions. A couple of the answers went on so long people in the audience were sort of fidgeting. So I think he became a better candidate in Iowa and New Hampshire, but we're not always quite sure which John Kerry you'll see.

GWEN IFILL: Finally, after having covered him collectively for, scary to think how many years, the two of you. What would you say most voters who are going to be paying attention for the first time during this election phase of the campaign, will see about John Kerry? What don't they see about John Kerry? What is it you know that they don't?

GLEN JOHNSON: That's a tough one. I think the thing that has struck me in covering him both in his 1996 race when he ran against Bill Weld, a very well funded popular well spoken Republican, and again here in the primary campaign, is he has this uncanny ability to deliver at the end. And in his business, it's about winning elections. As I said earlier, the getting there is not always pretty, but he has a way of getting there. Knowing him and knowing how he feels about President Bush and knowing how President Bush feels about him, I suspect that this period from September to November of this year is going to make the 2000 election, you know, seem like a patty cake game. It's really going to be quite different.

GWEN IFILL: What do you think, Jack?

JEFF ZELENY: The voters I talked to and he is talking to them, were struck by his curiosity. He always seems to do a good job now of listening to them. He seems to be interested and curious in what they're saying. If they have a health care problem, if their mother is in a retirement home or whatnot. He seems genuinely interested in events small and big. I think as he goes forward here, if he connects with people like we saw in Iowa and New Hampshire people might be impressed.

GWEN IFILL: Jeff Zeleny and Glen Johnson thank you very much.

JIM LEHRER: Now, some Kerry analysis from Shields and Brooks: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and "New York Times" columnist David Brooks. Kerry's campaign for this nomination should be remembered how?

DAVID BROOKS: I guess a couple things: one, Vietnam. I don't think he would be the nominee without his heroic story in Vietnam. That enabled him to really rise when Howard Dean imploded. I think the second way it will be remembered how he does in the fall doesn't affect this is that he is the most untested nominee in 20 or 30 years. Focus was on Dean for months and months. Dean imploded. Kerry rose and really nobody has gone after him in any serious way. So he will emerge into very unfamiliar territory. Massachusetts is not like America. And he will face criticism at his record, about his personality that he has never faced before. I think it is the short loading of this process that will be remembered for.

JIM LEHRER: Mark, what do you think? How will you remember this campaign of John Kerry?

MARK SHIELDS: I remember John Kerry, Jim, first of all, for being written off as dead man walking by many in the press bus last fall and by betting the farm and leaving New Hampshire, where his defeat was all but inevitable at the hands of Howard Dean, and moving his hopes, his resources, his campaign, essentially to Iowa, understanding that if he were going to turn things around it had to happen there and in fact doing it. And I guess in addition to that, there are certain things in every campaign over which you have no control. And John Kerry took advantage of the fact that in the year 2004, Democratic voters did not break into the usual factions, the warring factions arguing over theological esoteric points. They were looking for a winner and John Kerry presented himself by the strength of his biography, as David mentioned -- and the strength of his only as a winner and he fit what Democrats were looking for. He may not have excited them. He may not have had an emotional connection the same way that John Edwards and others did, but he certainly filled what they were looking for.

JIM LEHRER: David, you made a point a minute ago. You used the term when Howard Dean imploded. How does that fit into the success of Kerry? In other words, it's certainly a victory for Kerry. But is it also an... the imploding of Dean is a crucial part of this as well.

DAVID BROOKS: I'd say 75 percent the imploding of Dean.

JIM LEHRER: 75 percent.

DAVID BROOKS: I think he really is still the story of the year. The most amazing rise and then the fall and the fall came I think partly because he'd made some missteps but he had been making missteps all the way. The fall came because Democrats, the press, the scrutiny just got tremendous on Dean. He lost his equilibrium. And what Kerry was able to do and this was the 25 percent he contributed to, was he took the Dean themes, he took the Dean language as he later the Edwards language and he incorporated it into his own campaign.

JIM LEHRER: Do you agree with that, Mark, without Dean, there would be no Kerry?

MARK SHIELDS: I think the Dean-Gephardt decision to go after each other in Iowa....

JIM LEHRER: I mean Dean's falling, was that part, an essential part of why Kerry ended up doing so well?

MARK SHIELDS: No question. It was, Jim. I really do think that Kerry deserves enormous credit when he was back there for never savaging his opponents. I mean, he now leads a party which is remarkably united and free of any bitterness or any lingering bitterness from this campaign. And even though, you know, Howard Dean appeared way ahead of him, miles ahead of him as did Dick Gephardt, he really did resist that temptation to go for the jugular and I think that serves him very well today.

JIM LEHRER: Don't go away.

JIM LEHRER: Continuing now the run that ended yesterday. Margaret Warner has the story of North Carolina Senator John Edwards' campaign.

MARGARET WARNER: For John Edwards, the handwriting was on the wall early last evening as Super Tuesday returns began coming in. At 8:00, before some states had even finished voting, Edwards spoke to his supporters in Atlanta.

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS: We have been the little engine that could, and I am proud of what we've done together, you and I.

MARGARET WARNER: Edwards' formal withdrawal came late today, before an overflow crowd of 1,500 in his hometown of Raleigh, North Carolina.

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS: It has been my greatest honor, though, to have walked with you because from the beginning, this has never been my campaign. This has been your campaign and I am blessed to have been a part of it. And I'm also blessed to be back here at Broughton High School with so many friends and family and members of my community. I want to say a personal word about my friend John Kerry, who I know very well. This is a man that, from the time he served this country courageously in Vietnam, all the way through this campaign, I saw it, I know it. I saw what we went through in November and December and back in the summer when everyone said he didn't have a chance. But he showed the strength, the resilience, the courage that he has shown his entire life when he fought for us and for our country in Vietnam. He's done it throughout this campaign. The truth of the matter is that John Kerry has what it takes right here to be president of the United States. And I for one intend to do everything in my power to make him the next president of the United States. And I ask you to join me in this cause for our country, for our America. (Applause)

MARGARET WARNER: Now, we look at John Edwards' rise and fall and for that we're joined by two political reporters, this time from the Edwards beat. Mark Johnson of the "Charlotte Observer" started covering Edwards when he announced in January of last year. And Mitch Frank of "Time" Magazine traveled with him throughout this year. Welcome to you both.

John Edwards also had quite a roller coaster ride, Mark Johnson. Last year at one point he was the hot prospect. Then he was a very dim one. Tell us about that.

MARK JOHNSON: Absolutely right. He came into the race off of this sort of the rising star of the party. There were glowing magazine articles about him. Then he spent the first half of last year raising money and kind of dipped off the radar screen. And when the latter part of the year came around, when he actually was campaigning, they could not get any traction. The poll numbers did not go up, and there were some very dark hours in November and December when folks inside and outside the campaign really wondered, you know, whether this was possible. And a month later, there we were in Iowa, and in the last days or hours before the caucus, suddenly shoots from the bottom of the pack up to number two. And the ups and downs just followed from there.

MARGARET WARNER: Mitch, at the end of the first quarter of last year, in fact, John Edwards has raised more money than Howard Dean or John Kerry. What is your sense about why when the fall came he was just nowhere on the radar screen?

MITCH FRANK: Well, you're right, Margaret, in the fact that the money he raised in that quarter kind of bolted him to the front of pack. People were calling him the next Bill Clinton. What happened really is the issues changed. The aftermath of the war in Iraq really focused the Democratic Party on Howard Dean. Dean was the most stridently anti-war candidate and that brought him a lot of attention. Edwards voted for the resolution for the war in the Senate. He stood by that vote, unlike John Kerry, and that brought him kind of a lot of negative attention, kind of sank him down to the middle of the pack. It wasn't until the final two weeks in Iowa that he really started to reconnect with voters.

MARGARET WARNER: So, Mark, was that when it started to turn around? I saw him in Iowa in November and the crowds were sparse and he didn't seem to connect. By mid-January they had more people than could fit in a room. What turned it around for him that you saw?

MARK JOHNSON: Several factors working in his favor and first of all you had the Dean implosion. Dean, who had sucked all the oxygen out of the room was moving out of the way. Voters who had become disenchanted with him started shopping around. So at that same time, as they start to look around, what Edwards needed was for them to just give him a look. When they took a look at him, he was able to connect. He is by far the best stump speaker in the group. When the folks would tune in, he was able to close the deal for them. After Iowa, he was able to hang in there for New Hampshire and very quickly move on to a victory in South Carolina.

MARGARET WARNER: But Mitch, he came out of Iowa with this incredible boost, the surprising second place, as everyone called it, which probably wasn't surprising to you having covered him and watching what was happening. But I think to a lot of America it was. He ends up fourth in New Hampshire. What happened there?

MITCH FRANK: It was a huge disappointment. At one point the press van for the campaign in New Hampshire hit a moose that was kind of an analogy for the whole campaign in New Hampshire. All that momentum that he had in Iowa just evaporated, really with just a week between Iowa and the New Hampshire primary. Lee didn't have that chance that he had in Iowa two connect with voters one-on-one on the stump. Another big part of it was Howard Dean again. The media was focusing all the attention on Kerry for suddenly vaulting in the first place in Iowa, and Dean for suddenly imploding in Iowa. And there wasn't any coverage left over for the second place guy.

MARGARET WARNER: Not to mention the relentless coverage of the Dean scream which seemed to be on television that entire week.

MITCH FRANK: Sure.

MARGARET WARNER: Mark, all right, let's go to... he goes on to South Carolina, but there are a lot of other contests going on that day. He wins just one. What do his folks think happened that day? At that point they must have had a strategy. Did they still think they could win this thing? And if so, what happened or what didn't happen that they thought would happen?

MARK JOHNSON: Right. That's probably the pivotal night. He wins South Carolina and comes oh, so close in Oklahoma and there's the one point people sort of question about the campaign is what if he had gone back to Oklahoma one more time? What if he had made one more swing through there? He could have won Oklahoma.

MARGARET WARNER: He loses it to Wes Clark.

MARK JOHNSON: He would have gotten rid of Wesley Clark. Would have had two victories. And would have built up momentum. Instead he has the one victory, his home state, which somebody said, if you can't win your home state, you're al gore. And he moves on and doesn't have the momentum he really needs to catch up with Kerry, who the same night that Edwards wins one state, Kerry is winning five.

MARGARET WARNER: Mitch, what was he like privately during these ups and downs, particularly post the South Carolina but not winning anything else, as it really started to sink for him?

MITCH FRANK: Well, the amazing thing about Edwards is that he was probably the only candidate this entire campaign who never changed his strategy as Howard Dean rose up in the fall, all these other candidates were kind of shifting their message, focusing more on the war, going more negative on the president. Edwards at one point in December had this soul searching meeting with his staff saying should we change tactics? Should we go harsher on the other candidates? He said you know, my optimistic message is what has carried me so far. I'm not going to change who I am. But unfortunately after South Carolina when he didn't win Oklahoma and Wes Clark stayed in the race which probably cost Edwards Tennessee and Virginia, there was too much ground to make up on Kerry. He really kept sticking to that message, but he never did anything aggressive to kind of distinguish himself from Kerry until it was too late. At one point the campaign staff started telling all of us, look, we don't have to win Virginia and Tennessee. We said if you can't win in the South, how are you going to beat Kerry? They said we expect the media scrutiny to take Kerry down for us.

MARGARET WARNER: Mark, very quickly. Do you think this relentlessly upbeat message was a strategic decision on Edwards' part or is that who he really is?

MARK JOHNSON: Probably both. Definitely a strategic decision. That's one thing about the campaign. They stuck with their plan all the way through. You can look at Dean, you can look at Clark, you can find mistakes throughout the campaign where they said something wrong or steered their campaign the wrong course. You can't find that with the Edwards campaign. You don't find the glaring error. They really stuck to the plan they had. If not for some circumstances, it could have worked out better.

MARGARET WARNER: Mark Johnson and Mitch Frank, thank you both.

JIM LEHRER: Again to Mark Shields and David Brooks, this time for Edwards thoughts. What did Edwards accomplish by running for president?

MARK SHIELDS: John Edwards, first of all, Jim, in my judgment elevated politics and made his listeners feel it was more important than in the past, in terms of not simply comforting the comfortable but John Edwards reminded all of us that we had responsibilities to each other, especially to those who were poor and those whose skin color was different from our own. The other thing is he kept this race positive. It may have been his greatest strength and at the same time his greatest weakness. In a time when voters really were cynical, skeptical about major institutions, John Edwards captured that mood, but he brought to it an optimism which I think propelled him in the final analyses, prevented him from drawing stark and dramatic differences between himself and John Kerry.

JIM LEHRER: What would you add to that, David?

DAVID BROOKS: That he is a serious person. His problem was lack of policy depth. Clinton had star quality but had policy departments. There is no issue that John Edwards would die for or go to the mat for. If Dick Gephardt were sitting here at the table, he would talk to you about trade. He believed trade was an important issue. John Edwards never had a speech like that. His speech today was policy free. He didn't take the opportunity to promote a policy he had belief in with the depth of his heart. And I think that was the shallowness of the campaign. It was fantastic to watch. It was like a cruise romance, fun and exciting but lacked a certain depth because of the policy challenge.

JIM LEHRER: Do you think the positive nature of it was real?

DAVID BROOKS: That was real. But you can't be president of the world's most powerful nation on the basis that you ran a positive campaign. You have to know what you want to do in the White House. He did talk about the poor but even his discussion of the poor, does of lobbyists when you actually say what are you going to do about all this? His policy was extremely shallow and in some way, backward looking and obsolete.

JIM LEHRER: Do you agree with that, Mark?

MARK SHIELDS: I don't agree with that, Jim. I think John Edwards deserves enormous credit for raising issues that have not been raised in the past four years. We can argue back and forth about whether or not somebody has a better chance of being virtuous on a full stomach with a paycheck and a job, or being virtuous and then getting a full stomach and a paycheck -- which comes first. And I think John Edwards identified what the anxiety people are going through. He captured the mood of this country. This country has to understand that in the past four years, it has lost all its confidence in every major institution from the church to the corporations to the accounting firms, with the exception of the United States military. The press, you name it, and John Edwards understood that and I think spoke to it far better than any other national figure.

JIM LEHRER: Okay. Meanwhile there has been a mostly subdued republican reelection campaign for President Bush. But today Kerry's Super Tuesday triumph coincides with the Bush-Cheney campaign's unveiling of four political ads. They will go on the air in at least 16 states beginning tomorrow. Here's a sampling.

AD SPOKESMAN: The last few years have tested America in many ways. Some challenges we've seen

before, and some were like no others. But America rose to the challenge. What sees us through tough

times? Freedom, faith, families, and sacrifice. President Bush: Steady leadership in times of change.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: (ad) I know exactly where I want to lead this country. I know what we need to do to make the world more free and more peaceful. I know what we need to do to make sure every person has a chance at realizing the American dream. I know what we need to do to continue economic growth so people can find work, to raise the standards at schools so children can learn, to fulfill the promise to America's seniors. Americans are hard-working, decent, generous people. I'm optimistic about America because I believe in the people of America.

JIM LEHRER: And one more time to Shields and Brooks.

JIM LEHRER: David, Kerry versus Bush. What kind of campaign should we expect?

DAVID BROOKS: Long. Eight months. Usually in many years past people took time off after the primary season and got going up again toward convention time. But it was decided in '96 when Clinton buried Dole just after the primary season, that you couldn't take time off. You couldn't let the other side dominate the agenda, which means there is going to be hard core advertising like we just saw for eight months. My worry about this is that we've never seen something like this before. People, especially in the swing states where the ads are going to hit hard and heavy, they going to get sick of it by August and September? Once they're sick of it, they won't reengage in September and October. It's a matter of pacing. These ads are okay because it's just a taste of Bush. They don't really take you very far.

JIM LEHRER: What do you think about the campaign, Kerry versus Bush, Mark?

MARK SHIELDS: It is important to remind ourselves that a week is a lifetime in politics. In this case, two months is two eternities. Two months ago this campaign began. President Bush had a comfortable lead. We had just been benefiting and he had been benefiting politically from the capture of Saddam Hussein. Here we are two months later and there is a sense of urgency on the part of Republicans to get this campaign going and to spend the resources both political and financial that the president does have. I agree with David, it is going to be a long campaign. And I think what will be most intriguing is to watch not these ads, emphasizing leadership, steady leadership and that as much as they are when the negatives do come on John Kerry, whether in fact he'll be able to raise money of the same order of magnitude to counter those.

JIM LEHRER: David, some people, optimists have suggested that this could be a rare presidential election because there are so many fundamental differences between these two men, about the use of military power, preemptive strike in that area, taxes, Social Security reform, all kinds of things: Do you think this could be a serious campaign about serious issues for a change?

DAVID BROOKS: Are you trying to make me laugh? You know, in some ways it is. In some ways we choose cheap symbols to get at real issues. This is a fundamentally polarized electorate. These are two fundamentally polarized candidates. Somebody told me the two most unpopular states in the country are Texas and Massachusetts because one is seen as liberal, the other as conservative. Bush is pretty conservative, John Kerry voted the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate. So there are fundamental issues. But the way we tend to talk about these things in campaigns is not through policy analysis but through symbols, symbols of this Willie Horton, symbols of the Pledge of Allegiance and the symbols are shallow and stupid and make you depressed but they do tend to talk about real issues if you read into them what the symbol actually symbolizes.

JIM LEHRER: Mark, David, we'll continue this on Friday night. Thank you both very much.

FOCUS - MARRIAGE TESTS

JIM LEHRER: Now, the growing swirl around same-sex marriage. Kwame Holman has our update report.

KWAME HOLMAN: Portland, Oregon, became the latest venue for gay marriages today, as couples lined up to tie the knot. Multnomah County commissioners said denying marriage licenses to same-sex couples would violate Oregon's constitution.

LIS NAITO: The constitution of this state is crystal clear in this matter. I personally am committed to equal rights and equal protection for every person in this county and in this state. It is my duty to support and fully embrace the fundamental tenets on which our great nation is founded: That all people should be treated equally under the law.

KWAME HOLMAN: On the other side of the country in New York today, an official took a different view of the legal status of same-sex marriage in his state. New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.

ELIOT SPITZER: Those are not proper marriages, are not legal marriages pursuant to the statute. But the ultimate constitutionality and legality of those marriages will be determined only subsequent to a constitutional challenge that will almost inevitably move through the courts.

KWAME HOLMAN: The attorney general's decision came in response to endorsement of same- sex marriages by mayors in two New York towns.

SPOKESMAN: By the power invested in me by the state of New York, I now declare you legally wed. (Cheers and applause)

KWAME HOLMAN: In New Paltz, the mood was festive last Friday as Mayor Jason West performed 25 same-sex ceremonies. West was arraigned today on charges he knew some couples did not have marriage licenses, but said he would continue to marry couples from a waiting list of 1,000.

MAYOR JASON WEST: I have broken no laws and I intend to proceed the ceremonies on Saturday, unless I am advised otherwise by my attorneys.

KWAME HOLMAN: Sixty miles away in Nyack, New York, mayor John shields announced today he would marry gay couples, and wed his own same-sex partner as early as this week. The burst of same-sex marriages got started in November when the Massachusetts supreme court ruled gays have a constitutional right to wed. Then beginning last month, thousands have tied the knot in San Francisco, many coming from out of state for the chance to wed, including television personality Rosie O'Donnell and her longtime partner. In New Mexico two weeks ago, 66 couples were married in ceremonies that later were ruled invalid by the state's attorney general. Several states are moving against same-sex marriages. In Georgia this week, hundreds of demonstrators on both sides of the issue swarmed the state capital, where legislators are debating an amendment to the state constitution that would ban gay marriage. The roiling over the issue increased last week when President Bush called for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution outlawing gay marriage. But other republicans have questioned that. This week California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said on the "Tonight Show" that he opposed such an amendment. And in Washington today, there were dueling press conferences on the issue. The human rights campaign said an amendment would write discrimination into the Constitution. And Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who opposes gay marriages, said they would spread like wildfire if Congress doesn't act soon. The Senate subcommittee on constitutional law held a hearing on the issue today. Committee chairman John Cornyn of Texas said the proliferation of same-sex weddings made passage of the amendment essential.

SEN. JOHN CORNYN: Why is an amendment necessary? Two words: Activist judges. The only way to save laws deemed unconstitutional by activist judges is a constitutional amendment.

KWAME HOLMAN: Russ Feingold, the committee's top democrat, called the amendment effort election- year politicking.

SEN. RUSS FEINGOLD: I believe a constitutional amendment on marriage is unnecessary, divisive, and utterly inconsistent with our constitutional traditions, which this subcommittee has a special responsibility to protect. I object to the use of the constitutional amendment process for political purposes, and I am sorry to say that I believe that is exactly what is going on here.

KWAME HOLMAN: African-American Minister Richard Richardson rejected the argument that banning gay marriages is discrimination.

REV. RICHARD RICHARDSON: The traditional institute of marriage is not discrimination, and I find it rather offensive to call it that. Marriage was not created to oppress people; it was created for children. It boggles my mind that people would compare the traditional institution of marriage to slavery.

KWAME HOLMAN: Chuck Muth of a citizens' group argued against tinkering with the Constitution.

CHUCK MUTH: We open up the door just a crack, and then it gets pushed open a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more, and the next thing you know you have an 800-pound gorilla sitting in your midst. I'm afraid that once we start down that road by amending the constitution for the purpose of defining marriage as between as between one man and one woman, that that's going to open up the possibility of amending our Constitution in the future for all kinds of other aspects, and this is of great concern to me.

KWAME HOLMAN: Congressional leaders are divided on whether to push for a vote on a constitutional amendment this year, but the issue of gay marriage already has become part of the presidential campaign debate.

FOCUS - TROUBLED KINGDOM

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, the Disney shareholders meeting. Media correspondent Terence Smith has the story.

TERENCE SMITH: The Walt Disney company's annual shareholders meeting in Philadelphia today was vintage Disney, with Snow White, Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse and Cinderella in attendance. But it quickly became clear that there are clouds gathering over the magic kingdom. Michael Eisner, who has headed the huge media and entertainment conglomerate for two decades, is battling a full-blown shareholder revolt designed to push him out of his job. His critics complain that, under his sometimes abrasive leadership, the company and its stock have underperformed for several years, returning about half the average market gains since 1994.

ROY DISNEY: I used to say actually if I had enough rifles this would be over with.

SPOKESMAN: Careful.

ROY DISNEY: But I didn't say that.

TERENCE SMITH: The commanding general of this unlikely shareholder revolt is Roy Disney, nephew of Walt and 36-year director of the company until last November, when he and fellow director Stanley Gold jumped, before they were pushed, from the company board. They immediately launched the "Save Disney" campaign with one target in its crosshairs.

ROY DISNEY: Management has failed miserably at creating increased value for shareholders. Indeed, despite some recent short-term gains, which actually only put us back where we were eight years ago, they have been devaluing our assets, turning a unique institution into just another entertainment company.

TERENCE SMITH: Opening the annual meeting this morning, Eisner defended his performance, said the stock had increased 60 percent in the last year, and asserted that the company is rebounding under its current leadership.

MICHAEL EISNER: I love this company, and the board loves this company. And we are all passionate about the outcome of this company. In short, the message to you is simple: Your company has the management skill and creative talent to move into the future by building on the strength and on its legendary heritage.

TERENCE SMITH: Eisner is under assault from multiple quarters: Wall Street analysts, pension funds that hold large blocs of stock, as well as unhappy shareholders. On the eve of the annual meeting, more than 1,000 dissident shareholders lined up outside a Philadelphia hotel and around the block to vent their discontent. As many as 600 more could not fit into the rally, organized by Roy Disney and his "Save Disney" campaign. Shareholders Justine and Robert Graham explained why they made a pilgrimage from their home in Wilmington, Massachusetts.

JUSTINE GRAHAM: The old Disney, the one I grew up with - The Wonderful World of Disney on Channel 4 - I looked forward to as a child, it had a lot of heart, a lot of beauty and gave me a lot of happiness and I don't like to see something like that become pass .

ROBERT GRAHAM: It's not people are paying attention. They're not buying the idea that things are okay. And that either clean up your act or you certainly won't be reelected next time

TERENCE SMITH: At a news conference, Stanley Gold acknowledged that the chairman could not be deposed at today's meeting since Eisner and the current board are unopposed for reelection.

But he warned -

STANLEY GOLD: We will not go away. We will be here. We will continue this campaign to oust him. We will be here next week, next month, next year.

TERENCE SMITH: The "Save Disney" campaign got a huge boost in recent days when public employee pension funds in California, Oregon, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Ohio, Connecticut, Florida and New Jersey announced that they would withhold their support from Eisner. Christie Wood, senior investment officer of the $165 billion CALPERS, the California fund, objects in part to Eisner's huge compensation over the years.

CHRISTIE WOOD: He's taken $700 million out of the company since 1996, or realized that as compensation of some sort. What I would say is that it seems like a large number given the fact that the stock price hasn't been a good performer - in fact has lost shareholders money over the last five years.

DEMONSTRATOR: Creepy-crawly in our house, don't let Comcast buy the mouse.

TERENCE SMITH: Outside the annual meeting, union and public interest groups rallied to demonstrate against the proposed acquisition of Disney by Comcast, the Philadelphia-based cable giant. Comcast originally offered $54 billion for Disney, but the company's board rejected that as too low. Pennsylvania AFL-CIO president Bill George objected to the potential layoffs in any such merger.

BILL GEORGE: I'm going to toll you what is going to happen when they get done with this merger. Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse and Pluto are all going to be looking for jobs.

TERENCE SMITH: After a sometimes contentious meeting after which cameras were barred after opening statements, some 43 percent withhold their votes from the chairman. Eisner retains his job for the moment but the board may have to respond to such a strong expression of discontent.

TERENCE SMITH: Joining me now is Tom Wolzien, senior media analyst with Sanford C. Bernstein and company, who attended the Disney shareholder meeting today. Tom, thank you for joining us. What was it like in that extraordinarily long meeting? It went on for more than five hours. What was the atmosphere?'

TOM WOLZIEN: Well, there was a hall that held 500 people and another 400 or 500 in the spillover facility. Most of the people in the room were small shareholders who came in to express their support for Roy Disney and their opposition to Michael Eisner, so it was a very vociferous group for the first part of the session. Then the company put virtually every one of its divisional managers up to talk about how things were going. That's really the reason that the session went on for about four hours and something.

TERENCE SMITH: Did some of the shareholders confront Michael Eisner?

TOM WOLZIEN: There was a lot of confrontation during the session -- during the Q and A part of the session where basically people were saying you lost value in our stock over the last five years, that we don't think that Disney has the same magic that it used to have.

TERENCE SMITH: This 43 percent that decided to withhold their vote, put that in perspective for us -- how high it is relative to others.

TOM WOLZIEN: Well, in recent media history the last vote that was withheld was the 22 percent vote at then AOL Time Warner where that was enough to drive chairman Steve Case out at 22 percent.

TERENCE SMITH: So what, given this vote, is the board likely to do now?

TOM WOLZIEN: The board is looking at a proposal to split the championship and the CEO so effectively the CEO is not reporting to himself. That's almost assured to happen at this point. That was one of the principal reasons that was given for the withholding of votes for Michael Eisner. That's a for sure. How far beyond that it goes, whether there's ultimately whether Mr. Eisner leaves the company completely as a result of this is difficult to tell. The problem the board really has in sorting out is what is its fiduciary responsibility of looking at a 43 percent withhold. What the fiduciary responsibility to the shareholders or bluntly, can it be sued if it keeps Eisner around?

TERENCE SMITH: Does this make, in your view as an analyst, does this make Disney more vulnerable to a hostile takeover bid such a Comcast put forward last month?

TOM WOLZIEN: Well certainly it gives Comcast a good chance to come back in and Comcast late today indicated that it had some interest in having further discussions with the independent directors. However, the Comcast bid, the way it stands now is about $23 a share for Disney's stock that is up in the 26, 27 range. And I think most people would think it would have to get up to 30 to make sense for the Disney board to really seriously consider it.

TERENCE SMITH: Might this encourage other conglomerates to come forward?

TOM WOLZIEN: Difficult to say. The normal suspects basically said they're not interested -- other media companies. But you know when you go through the history of media, you never know who is going to get bitten by the Hollywood virus. I mean, who would have said that Matsushita, Panasonic would have bid for Universal or Seagram's or Vivendi, so you just really don't know if somebody is going to come in out of the woodwork but as far as the normal media players, it doesn't look like there is anybody there is ready to go.

TERENCE SMITH: Does it seem like we are now in a new era of more vigorous shareholder momentum and expressing of opinion?

TOM WOLZIEN: I think so. I think as long as the stock prices were high and running up in the late 90s, everybody just would love to take the money. Then during the first part of the 2000s, people were kind of shell shocked and trying to figure out what they had left. Now I think they're at the point of recovering and saying hey, wait a second. It's my money, it's my share. I want to be felt. The other side of that is however, all of the people today who are protesting could have sold out of Disney and put their money somewhere else when where they thought it might have been done better. They didn't have to stay there and keep their money. They were not locked into this company.

TERENCE SMITH: Tom Wolzien, thank you very much.

TOM WOLZIEN: Thanks, Mr. Smith.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major developments of the day: John Kerry built an insurmountable lead in the Democratic presidential race, after sweeping nine of ten Super Tuesday contests. His last major opponent, John Edwards, ended his campaign. And Iraqi officials said two violent attacks Monday against Shiites observing a religious holiday Monday killed 271 and injured nearly 400. We'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening with a rare look at the late Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun among other things. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.