The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight, Elizabeth Farnsworth gets an update of the navy's court of inquiry into the submarine tragedy, Ray Suarez looks beyond the new census numbers to the cultural influence of Hispanic Americans, and Mark Shields and Paul Gigot provide their weekly political analysis. It all follows our summary of the news this Friday.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: This was another bad day on Wall Street, ending a dismal week for the markets: The worst ever for the Dow Jones industrial average. It has lost 821 points, or nearly 8%, over the past five sessions. Today, it closed down 207 points, or 2%, at 9823. The NASDAQ was down 49 points to close at 1890. Analysts cited continuing corporate profit and economic worries for today's losses. The takeover of TransWorld Airlines by American airlines took another major step today. The anti-trust division of the Justice Department issued a brief statement saying it would not challenge the $ 740 million deal. T.W.A. Officials had said the only alternative was to liquidate their financially troubled airline. The agreement is expected to be finalized now in April. Overseas today, commandos stormed a hijacked Russian plane in Medina, Saudi Arabia, freeing more than 100 hostages. We have a report from Kevin Dunn of Independent Television News.

KEVIN DUNN: This was the moment when the Saudis decided to end the hijacking by force -- armed commandos breaking through doors and emergency exits to free more than 100 people on board. It was later revealed that a hijacker stabbed and killed a female flight attendant before he was shot dead. A Turkish passenger was also killed. TheSaudi troops wrestled two men to the ground, assumed to be the Chechen hijackers. Paramedics rushed one person off the plane on a stretcher as the freed hostages were hurriedly directed to buses and to safety, their liberation bringing to an end a drama which began when the Russian aircraft left Istanbul for Moscow yesterday afternoon. This man, Aslambek Arsayev, a former nationalist minister in Chechnya, was said to have led the hijacking to demand an end to Russian military operations in the rebellious republic. As the Saudi troops congratulated themselves, the authorities said they had sought a peaceful end to the hijack, but decided to use force when the hijackers threatened to blow up the plane.

JIM LEHRER: Saudi officials declined to say how many suspects were detained. Russia immediately demanded their return for trial. But the countries have no extradition agreement. In Macedonia today, government forces pounded the hills above the city of Tetovo with heavy artillery rounds. They're trying to drive ethnic Albanian rebels north to Kosovo. The guerrillas returned fire with automatic weapons. State-run radio described the combat as real war. Five civilians were wounded; others continued to flee. British authorities today began to kill healthy pigs, goats and sheep. It was the most aggressive plan yet, as the government tries to stop the spread of foot-and-mouth disease. A million animals could be slaughtered near three major outbreak areas over several weeks. Some farm groups said the new policy could spark a rural revolt. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to, the U.S.S. "Greeneville" investigation, the Hispanic influence, and Shields and Gigot.

UPDATE - COURT OF INQUIRY

JIM LEHRER: Elizabeth Farnsworth has our update on the submarine court of inquiry.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: A panel of three admirals at Pearl Harbor is wrapping up its second week of testimony on the crash of the U.S. Submarine Greeneville with the Japanese trawler. The collision left nine Japanese missing and presumed dead. Former coast guard lawyer and investigator Jay Fidell is following the proceedings for us. He's now in private practice in Honolulu.

Hi, Jay. Let's start with today. What happened and what was said.? Who spoke -- who testified and what was said?

JAY FIDELL: There have been two witnesses so far today. One is Chief McGiboney and he was the sonar supervisor, supervising two sonar men who were there, one of whom was unqualified. As a result of the concern about that, the chief had asked for a lawyer and apparently had legal vision before he testified. In any event, through his testimony, it was confirmed again that he did not have quite sufficient information to determine exactly what the proximity of the contact was; that is the contact with the Ehime Maru. In other words, you have to take legs. And a leg allows the sonar man to read the distance. And in this case he had one short leg. He had no control over that and he didn't have the information and he didn't know the leg was short or that the distance was not accurate.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Why? Why not?

JAY FIDELL: Because the information about the distance of the leg is known to the commanding officer and the officer of the deck in the control room. And he was in the sonar room so he would not know about navigational issues like that. The information he received is what he processed and what he processed was that the submarine was not near a close contact. So everything seemed normal. And he said he would not have changed anything that was done including what was done by the unsupervised, unqualified sonar man seaman in that sonar room at that time. I think what was interesting in the examination by the court and, by way, Elizabeth, the court is still hot. They're still interested, they're still asking questions, they're still pursuing areas that were recommended to them by the original investigator, Admiral Griffiths, and they are still very much doing their own examination. They asked about the watch bill and the watch bill included the unqualified sonar man sitting in the sonar room. And they pointed out in their questions -

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Explain what a watch bill is.

JAY FIDELL: Sorry. A watch bill is a list of the individuals on the submarine who are assigned to certain posts. It's very important to know who is at every given post and whether that individual is properly qualified to sit at that particular post. In this case there was an issue of one particular post that was being manned by an unqualified sonar man and that name was on the watch bill. Various questions about the watch bill. For example, nine out of 13 people on the watch bill for the area of the sonar room and control room were switched in the middle of this trip. That was quite remarkable. In the words of the members of the court asking about it, it was embarrassing and in fact astounding. You can tell now that there will be some further play on this issue regarding the watch bill. Following Chief McGonagle, what we had was the testimony of Lieutenant Van Winkle. Lieutenant Van Winkle was the weapons officer and responsible for the sonar room and he had to admit there were problems with the watch bill. He himself, he said, did not notice that the sonar man sitting in that particular seat was unqualified. Both of these witnesses -- he was not present by the way on the day of the accident. He was off the ship at a school. And with him were some 20 to 21 crew members from his department including seven or eight sonar men who presumably were qualified and who could have been sitting in the sonar room on that day. The court is looking carefully at the staffing issue here, which was originally identified by Admiral Griffiths in his original report.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Jay, let's go back over some of the highlights of the week. I know you weren't every single second but from what you saw and the transcripts you read, tell us first about the captain of the Japanese trawler. He really gave some dramatic testimony, even about the sounds of this event, didn't he, this crash?

JAY FIDELL: Oh, yes. In a word, he as overpowered by what happened. It happened so quickly. He didn't understand exactly what had happened and he himself was swept off the ship. There was virtually nothing he could do. And his testimony, which he in part read and he read it in Japanese so that the Japanese families could understand clearly for the first time in their own language what the testimony was, was a story of violence and deafening sounds, very quick sinking of the ship. It was remarkable testimony. It does not go to exactly what happened in the control room of the Greeneville but it is important that the court hear this testimony to know what followed.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And on Monday Admiral Konetzni tell us who he is and what he added to the overall picture of what happened; he was pretty dramatic too.

JAY FIDELL: Oh, yeah. He is the most senior witness to testify so far. He is the boss. He is the commander of the Pacific submarine fleet. And he was not kind to Commander Waddle, indicated that it all came back to Commander Waddle and some of the other issues that were raised as to what was wrong in the submarine or in the procedures in the submarine were red herring and that in fact his concern was what Commander Waddle did, he said he did it too quickly and he said although he felt that Commander Waddle was his friend, his brother, his son, and that he -- deeply caring about Commander Waddle, he was angry with him and his remark was he would like to go over there and hit him for what he had done in moving too quickly and in causing the accident. This testimony was damaging to Commander Waddle for sure.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And Captain Robert Brandhuber also testified. Tell us who he is and how he happened to be on the submarine.

JAY FIDELL: Elizabeth, Captain Brandhuber was the chief of staff under Admiral Konetzni. He was on the submarine as an escort. He was the acting commander of the pacific submarine fleet and so had lots of power. He wore the epaulet so to speak of Admiral Konetzni that way. The question why is didn't he intervene. What information did he have that might have led him to tell commander waddle what to do to avoid unsafe maneuvers? His testimony which was obviously uncomfortable for him, he did not see anything unreasonable although he thought Commander Waddle was moving a little quickly but nothing as quickly as would warrant intervention.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Commander Waddle's lawyer has offered a proffer. Please describe what a proffer is and what is in this letter.

JAY FIDELL: A proffer is an offer of testimony. You will recall that Commander Waddle as well as Mr. Cohen, the OD, have requested testimonial immunity. In response to that request, back on March 1st or so, March 3 specifically, Admiral Fargo requested that both of them make proffers, that is, offers of what evidence they might give in immune testimony. Mr. Cohen immediately provided his proffer. Commander Waddle did not provide his proffer until a day or two ago when he apparently gave it to the convening authority, Admiral Fargo and, and drove up here to the area of the media village and distributed copies to the members of the press indicating that for him this is at least in part a battle for public opinion. In any event, this proffer or offer of testimony offers to testify about all the things that have come up that are subjective things that only Commander Waddle could talk about. It's tantalizing, because he would lend a certain additional level of information to the investigation. So it is a carrot and a stick. The carrot is that it would help find the truth but the stick is that as far as he's concerned, Commander Waddle's original statement before he was identified as party to the investigation was inappropriately taken and cannot be used as evidence, and in fact that all of the proceedings that followed it are tainted by its inadmissibility. So this offer letter that he made is something that Commander - rather Admiral Fargo is going to have to decide - and my guess, Elizabeth, is that he will decide this weekend or early next week because there are not that many witnesses left to testify. We know that the three parties have not testified and the immunity question goes to whether and when they will. And we know that the civilians have not been called to testify and may not be called. We are still waiting for this afternoon -- it will be Lieutenant Commander Westerner Werner, who is the public affairs officer, who can explain the ship's movement because there is a question about who ordered the ship to move that day and finally Petty Officer Seacrest who is the fire control technician who is plotting the target motion analysis and did not identify this as a close contact just prior to the collision. Those witnesses will be early next week. So there is plenty to wait for. We have actually two areas going. We have the hearing itself, and we have the action now anticipated from Admiral Fargo on the various legal issues pending on his desk.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Jay Fidell, thanks very much for keeping track of this for us.

JAY FIDELL: Thank you, Elizabeth.

FOCUS - AMERICA BY THE NUMBERS

JIM LEHRER: Hispanics in America, and to Ray Suarez.

RAY SUAREZ: The face of this country is increasingly multicolored and multi-cultured. Census figures released this week highlighted, in particular, the skyrocketing population growth of Hispanics in the last decade. Since 1990, the Latino population surged 57.9%, from 22.3 million to 35.3 million, drawing virtually even with non- Hispanic blacks as the nation's largest minority group. We begin our look at these new demographic dynamics with an encore of an essay by Richard Rodriguez of the Pacific News Service.

ROGER ROSENBLATT: Since the mid-19th century, when America became an immigrant country, the unspoken price of admission has been linguistic uniformity. Those of use who are the children of immigrants, who came to this country speaking a language other than English, remember the loosening hold of a grandmother's Swedish, or Yiddish, or Chinese. (Ricky Martin Music) Even while bilingual education is prohibited from classrooms in California, Spanish is heard everywhere in the nation. Because of the recent massive migration of Latin Americans northward, the United States has became the fifth-largest Spanish-speaking country in the world, after Mexico, Spain, Argentina, and Colombia. Today, Los Angeles-- this city named in 18th-century Spanish, but laconically renamed by Midwesterners as L.A.-- long the nation's largest Hispanic city, Los Angeles has become a Latin American capital, and, truly again, Los Angeles. It's the scale that impresses. Instead of an earlier century's immigrant newspaper, say, on Manhattan's lower East side, today's highest-rated TV and radio stations in Los Angeles are Spanish-speaking. (Music) On Univision, the popular Spanish-language network, headquartered here, on soap operas, the telenovelas imported from Caracas or Mexico City, the faces are blond, not brown. (Spanish commercial) But the commercials are red, white, and blue: McDonald's and Ford and Colgate-Palmolive. Univision's audience is primarily working-class and national. Spanish has, after all, become the language of unskilled, but eager hands, from chicken- plucking southern towns to Alaskan fishing villages, from Hartford to Boise. The genius of America is the way so many foreign phrases and words found their way onto the American tongue, even while the nation assimilated the immigrant. Who can be surprised that so many new Spanish words are finding their way into our vocabulary? But vast and the mundane recurrence of Spanish today-- on public signs, on billboards, on the airwaves-- is blurring the linguistic border between the United States and Latin America. What's more, this blurring is happening because of the poor. Normally, we expect great social change to happen the other way: To trickle down from on top, or to be mandated from on high. But Spanish is becoming the unofficial second language of America because of dishwashers and gardeners and logically so: If the laborer speaks Spanish, then the contractor needs to learn Spanish. If the housekeeper speaks Spanish, then the upper-middle class children also begin to hear it and know it. One notices of late on the American tongue a distinctly working-class Spanish, the diction often male, often crude, and funny. We are destined to become a bilingual Belgium or a new Quebec. I predict that the children of today's Latin-American immigrants will come to assume U.S. English as their primary language.

RAY SUAREZ: And NewsHour essayist Richard Rodriguez is with us now. He is of Mexican ancestry. With more perspective on Hispanics and their influence in the United States we are also joined by: Clara Rodriguez, a professor of sociology at Fordham University and author of "Changing Race: Latinos, the Census and the History of Ethnicity in the United States." She is of Puerto Rican ancestry. Samuel Betances, a professor of sociology at Northeastern Illinois University; he is also of Puerto Rican origin. And Ilan Stavans, a professor of Spanish at Amherst College and author of "Tropical Synagogues: Short Stories by Jewish Latin American writers." He was born in Mexico. Welcome to you all.

Richard, demographers have been talking about this day for 25 or more years, talking about the date when Latinos would become the largest minority group in the country. And the date was 2015 then it became 2010 and then 2005. Here it is. What does it mean?

RICHARD RODRIGUEZ: Well, let me just say there's something really unseemly about all of this in the sense that the way it's being portrayed by the Census Bureau that we are replacing African Americans as the largest minority group seems to propose that we are opposite African Americans -- we are not African -- when in fact we are. Every race of the world is in Latin America, Africans included. Africans have been part of the history of Latin America. The United States is portraying us as a new third race or third group that are coming in between white and black. I think it does a disservice to African Americans and I think it does a disservice to our knowledge of who we are as Hispanics. We are not a racial group. We are not some new brown people in the United States. We are every race of the world, united under this strange noun called Hispanic.

RAY SUAREZ: So, Samuel Betances, do we mark this moment at all if you hear your colleague's suggestion?

SAMUEL BETANCES: Well, I think the future is ahead of schedule big time with a lot of Latinos and a lot of people who just got here and there are people that have been here for generations. I'm not so sure that we are united as Richard Rodriguez claims. I think we need to work towards that, but if you take a look at the fact that many of us in urban areas find ourselves coming from Catholic cultures, and yet there are not enough Catholic priests for the Irish and the Poles and the Germans and as a result many Pentecostals, Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah Witnesses who in some ways are anti-Catholic, so that while people find comfort in faith and community groups, they don't find unity among Latinos who are Catholic because of different theological interpretations. African Americans are a little bit worried sometimes that Latinos, we have our own brand of racism whether we got it from our Mexican heritage or Puerto Rican heritage or otherwise, we sometimes look toward the European ideal as something excellent. So, you know, when the Europeans came over, the Jews and the Protestants and the Catholics, they had the Conference of Christians and Jews. I don't see a Conference of African Americans and Latinos or Hispanics to work at collaboration. Plus I also see that young men, I mean there are going to be a lot of young men and young men of Latino dissent like young men who are white and black, are the people who commit crimes. If they're not welcome and if they're not educated, because we have the numbers but we won't have the powers unless we get educated, then those people are going to create alternative families that we call gangs. And instead of getting their names on walls with degrees and awards, they'll spray paint them and get them there anyway. So I see a challenge ahead. The future is ahead of schedule. It comes with a Latin beat, and we are challenged. It is an exciting time. We can see it as problematic, or we can see it as opportunities.

RAY SUAREZ: Clara Rodriguez, it sounds like we have a definitional problem here. Do these 35 million people fit comfortably under the umbrella term, Hispanic?

CLARA RODRIGUEZ: Well, I actually think they do -- maybe not under the term Hispanic; maybe under the term Latino, but I actually think that the similarities are quite strong. And I know that in my own experience, when I first began to visit and to know of other Latino communities that were different from the Puerto Rican communities that I knew in New York, what really struck me was that I began with a sense that we were so different, and I quickly realized that we were so similar in so many ways. We all, many Latino communities are bandios, whether they're in New York City or in California. I saw, in addition to the very basic fact that I could understand and communicate with Latinos even though we spoke Spanish differently, that we had very similar educational experiences; that we had similar experiences and positions, actually, in the labor market -- that even some of the voting issues that we had dealt with had echoes, resonated with the other Latinos that I met. And I also see with the newer immigrant Latino communities, that they remind me quite a bit of the earlier Puerto Rican communities that I grew up in and that I was a part of. So I think, of course, there are differences. I think there are differences in all groups. But I think that there are also very strong similarities.

RAY SUAREZ: Ilan Stavans, how do you come down on these questions?

ILAN STAVANS: I think we are witnessing and at the same time participants in a crucial moment in American history. We have seen the emergence of a new Latino nation. In the 19th century, Simon Bolivar, one of the major libertadoris of Latin America dreamed of creating a republic of a republics in the Southern Hemisphere. But as many dreams of the 19th century -- many political dreams -- it came to nothing. And ironically 150 years later, we have a new Latino nation north of the border at the very heart -- in the very belly of that country that was perceived for many years as the enemy. Many of us growing up in Mexico or in Colombia or in Argentina never really came across, lived nearby a Puerto Rican or a Cuban. And here we are for the first time becoming a nation made of multiple nations. I think it is a very exciting time. I think we are not bilingual but probably multilingual -- Spanish, English and Spanglish, which I think is the language of this new minority. And I think there is a give and take. We have a lot to offer to this country and we have a lot to learn from this country as well.

RAY SUAREZ: But does that term, that way of counting, put together people who see themselves as a part, people who have different migration histories, different social standing, different educational level, different colors, along with different regions of the country?

ILAN STAVANS: I think it certainly does. We come from different backgrounds. We really exemplify this idea of e pluribus Unum -- the unity and the diversity or vice versa. There is a lot that we have to learn in order to live together, Latin Americans have also had to learn to be democratic, to live with one another. Puerto Ricans and Cubans have not always lived in peace. Mexican Americans and Central Americans have also had their tensions. We're white, we're black, we're upper class, we're middle class, we're lower class. There is a new nation that is beginning to shape itself. I think the media, radio, particularly, television, music, is creating this sense of unity in a way that is perhaps shaping the street and the classroom and the family room; is announcing that in order to be a unity, we have to explore our diversity, be honest with ourselves, be honest with the rest of the country and by doing so, we will understand that in the multiplicity, there is also power.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, Richard Rodriguez, if a sociologist were sitting down with a blank page to start work on a book about this era we have been talking about, if you concentrated on the high levels of intermarriage among these people, you might be led in one direction; if you concentrated on the high levels of residential segregation, you might be led to a very different conclusion. Which is going to set the tone for the coming era?

RICHARD RODRIGUEZ: I think both are going to be coincidence in the sense that California, for example, has one of the highest rates of miscegenation in the United States. But we also have the highest number of gated communities. In other words, we are closing in together and we're drawing apart at the same time. This is happening at a time in which United States clearly is becoming -- not simply Hispanics are becoming aware of each other but the United States is becoming aware of the Americas. The Latinization of the United States is proceeding as in a country that has been traditionally East-West is become increasingly in its thinking North-South, it's becoming aware of Canada and Mexico immediately and hemispherically becoming aware of America within the Americas. The other question one has to ask though, too, is what the relationship is of the so-called Hispanic to these other large groups of Americans now, the Asian, the black, the white. I mean, 19th century America convinced Sicilian grandmothers and Germans and polish Jews that they were white in America. And in the same way America, bureaucratic America is trying to convince all of us that we are Hispanic. At the time that it is doing this, we are convincing America, the United States, that it is part of the Americas because suddenly there are 34, 35, 36 million of us who move back and forth at a North-South line. We are changing you, the United States, even while you give us this name, this absurdity and you call us Hispanic.

RAY SUAREZ: Samuel Betances, so it is a two-way traffic. You agree with that?

SAMUEL BETANCES: It is a two-way traffic. My wife and I have a home in Puerto Rico. We live in Chicago. That's part of it. The other part of it is that there are some people that come that cannot exercise that option. and the interesting and fascinating thing about this Latino explosion in the demographics is that we now find Latinos in North Carolina, in South Carolina, in Mississippi, in Arkansas, and people from Central America in significant numbers. And I think if it frightens people, two things that would I caution. Numberone, just keep in mind, please, that the United States of America and I say this in a very respectful manner, was founded by illegal aliens. I mean, the English did not give their passports to the indigenous American Indians. So that all of us in one way or another have come from different places and now there is this tremendous challenge. In terms of language, bilingual education is not something that is likely to make America bilingual, but properly implemented can make instruction understood. As long as we're able to work along those lines, people will be able to become powerful, productive patriotic Americans like the Mexican Americans and the Latinos during World War II and the Korean conflict which came back with more Congressional Medals of Honor than any category of American citizens. I believe that if we bring these people, unleash their potential, respect them and realize that what we have got here are citizens of the Americas, adding value to our collective journey, we can succeed and people like me, hey, I'm an American. I love this country. But I do have this option once in awhile, a couple of times a year, because I am educated and as a professional, I can afford it, go back and forth. So there will be some back and forth but above all else, all of us have to move forward and America will be greater if we embrace this talent and embrace the Latinos, welcome them in so that they can expand the mosaic that makes us all proud to be Americans.

RAY SUAREZ: Professor Rodriguez, so many of you during this conversation have been talking about differences and samenesses, things that make this group American, very American and part of the American story, things that still make them a people apart. Which is it?

CLARA RODRIGUEZ: Which is it?

RAY SUAREZ: Yeah.

CLARA RODRIGUEZ: I think it's both. I think... but I think in being both, what Latinos are beginning to say to America, to the United States, is that it is possible to be both. In the same way that Professor Betances can have a home in Puerto Rico where he speaks French or Spanish, he also can consider himself an American. So I think that that's the message. There are similarities; there are differences. It is interesting. People of think about bilingual -- being bilingual as if that were something that meant, one, you had a problem and two, you only spoke one language. But the meaning of the word is to speak two languages. And I think that that's an ideal to which all Americans might want to subscribe, given that we are increasingly living in a global world. So I think it's both, and I think it's good that it's both.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, I'm going to have to end it there. Thank you guests all.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, political analysis by Shields and Gigot.

FOCUS - POLITICAL WRAP

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, Shields and Gigot. Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and "Wall Street Journal" columnist Paul Gigot. Produce Mark, President Bush has been criticized this week for going back on a campaign pledge having to do with carbon dioxide. Does he deserve to be criticized?

MARK SHIELDS: He does, Jim. Any time you're politician office holder and there is a sentence that says in the headline, retreat, renege, reverse, flip-flop -- it's not a plus; you want to change the subject. And when somebody changes his mind, an office holder, and comes to your position, you basically say he grown, he's flexible, matured -- ability to grow. When he does the opposite and leaves a position that he has held and you've supported, he is Benedict Arnold. He's Judas Escariah; he's worse. So what the President did, I think, is not that widely known at this point. I don't think it is a killer. I don't think his numbers are going to plummet but Democrats completed a nationwide poll; Republicans in the White House, I'm sure, have access to very similar numbers, and they show that the biggest vulnerability, the Achilles Heel of George Bush's presidency and the party he leads, is that this thing is too close to the well healed and the well connected, and agree that this is seen as his position on carbon dioxide has been influenced by big oil, big coal, big interests -- that is a potential problem for him politically -- as well as for the lungs of America's children and the world's children.

JIM LEHRER: How do you read it, Paul.

PAUL GIGOT: Industry was divided on this. Big natural gas, if you will, was on the other side of it, so there is no question that this wasn't just an industry versus right thinking, good honorable people; this was a real debate about policy. And I think he did the right thing because if he hadn't, his energy policy was dead, Jim, it was over. They've got the lights going out in California. They've got brownouts predicted in the East Coast and New York and I'll tell you when summer comes around and it's 90 and the air conditioning doesn't come on, that's a lot bigger problem than whether carbon dioxide may or may not, in fact, be causing global warming. That's what he had to focus on.

JIM LEHRER: What about just the politics of saying one thing as a candidate and then doing another within a couple of months after you've been elected -- is that a problem for him? Forget the issues of carbon dioxide for a moment.

PAUL GIGOT: Remember the furious debates Mark and I had about the carbon dioxide policy?

JIM LEHRER: It seems like only yesterday.

PAUL GIGOT: We never even mentioned it. In fact, it was two lines in a speech, Jim. IN n fact, the biggest divide in this election was over the Kyoto Treaty where Bush was clearly against it.

JIM LEHRER: The global warming treaty.

PAUL GIGOT: The global warming treaty. Gore was clearly for it. The classification of carbon dioxide as a pollutant really contradicted what was Bush's rhetorical position throughout the campaign. I think it is much less of a real flip-flop.

MARK SHIELDS: Let me disagree. George Bush carried the burden politically of a miserable environmental record in Texas, by any standard. I mean, Houston's air, the rest of it, he wanted to move away from it. The 29th of September, major promo, as a major statement on the environment, they trumpeted the fact, the Bush folks did that he was going to impose mandatory reduction targets on carbon dioxide as opposed to Al Gore's voluntary, that he was tougher on these carbon dioxide production than was Al Gore, the noted environmentalist. This was not a casual line dropped at the end of the day like Bill Clinton's gays in the military. This was all out policy.

JIM LEHRER: We ran that the other night, but that's a never mind kind of thing.

PAUL GIGOT: Well, I don't think it was all that central - I really don't. I mean, I read that speech. It was billed as an energy speech as much as anything. It balanced energy and environmental speech. In fact, I spent all week trying to find out who put it in. And there was nobody who took any responsibility for putting it in.

JIM LEHRER: I see. Well, that doesn't surprise you now, does it?

PAUL GIGOT: No. I suppose not.

JIM LEHRER: The Democrats have also been on the President this week, Paul, for accusing him of talking down the economy, saying that first of all it was Vice President Cheney who said there was going to be a recession and then President Bush followed up saying things are kind of grim. Are the Democrats on to something?

PAUL GIGOT: Yes. I think it is a clever strategy by Tom Daschle, the Senate Democratic leader, Jim, because he knows that in the long run, a slow economy, doldrums, recession is very bad for Bush, certainly if it extends through 2002. But in the short-term it's an asset. Why is it an asset - because it makes it more likely that Democrats are going to feel pressure to do something about the economy, and right now the doing something about the economy, the only plan on the table is George W. Bush's tax cut. And in fact what's happening is some Democrats are now beginning to talk with the White House, even some surprising liberal Democrats in the Senate, Johnny Corazon of New Jersey, Bob Graham of Florida have had talks with the White House about speeding up the implementation of the tax cut, doing it this year because the Bush plan was designed in good times. It was designed for a surplus. And so it's phased in and back loaded and they're saying let's get more bang for the buck. Even Robert Rubin, the former Treasury Secretary, said if we're going to have a tax cut -

JIM LEHRER: Do it now.

PAUL GIGOT: -- do it now. And I think what Daschle is trying to do is he's trying to slow that down a little bit and blame Bush for whatever slowdown there is, try to bring some of these Democrats back.

JIM LEHRER: But what about the specific charge, Mark, that the President has actually been talking down the economy in order to justify his tax cuts, and say see, I told you we needed tax cuts because look what the economy is doing?

MARK SHIELDS: I don't think there is any question that is a developed strategy. It was born in the campaign, you recall. Trying to rob Al Gore of any advantage he might receive as the Vice President of Bill Clinton during the greatest boom -- eight-year boom in the nation's history -- both Vice President Cheney, the nominee then, and Governor Bush warned about this signs of recession out there. I think the President walks a very dangerous line. I think it makes sense for him politically. Paul makes an argument that it probably does give a certain argument in the case for his tax cut, Jim, but what a President has to be in addition to being candid, is a President has to be reassuring. That's what a leader is. If you think that the economy is bad, the only analogy I can use, you are in a stopped subway car between stations, you want at that point an authoritative voice to come in and say this is where we are -- this is what' being done, this is how we are going to get out of here. And I don't think - I think there has been enough of that -- very little reassurance in the President's rhetoric.

JIM LEHRER: That's an interesting point, isn't it, Paul, that what a President's job, when times are bad, not to say they're going to get worse but maybe... what do you think about that?

PAUL GIGOT: I do. I mean, I think there is a line you have to walk. You don't want to say that-- to put-- to make people frightened or hurt consumer confidence. There is no question about that -- but it's pretty clear this downturn started last autumn -- I mean -- 1.1% growth in the fourth quarter, 2.2% in the third quarter....

JIM LEHRER: It was a real slowdown and Bush didn't cause it by his words is what you're saying.

PAUL GIGOT: No, I think that that's just not a plausible case at all. But you do want to draw a fine line and walk a fine line; and I think that when I talk to the people in the White House, that's what they admit that they're trying to do because there is no great benefit in just saying we're all going to hell because then it can hurt.

JIM LEHRER: But what is your own view? Do you think he stepped over the line?

PAUL GIGOT: No, I don't think so. I mean, you know, he did say, I think rightly, this week when the stock market is down is that he is concerned. But look if he said everything is sunshine, what would be the argument? Like they made against his father -- he doesn't care. He's oblivious. He's out of touch.

JIM LEHRER: Another subject. Not always interested in talking about polls but the "New York Times"/CBS Poll this week, Mark, was fascinating; it showed that more than 60% of the people like the job President Bush is doing but barely 40% think he's in charge. How do you, plain that?

MARK SHIELDS: I think there is a way of explaining-- I mean people do like President Bush. His unfavorable has dropped considerably and his favorable ratings are comparable to those of Bill Clinton at this point, not as high as his dad's or Mr. Reagan -- or Jimmy Carter. But, you know, they're certainly more than respectable. But I don't think it is a real problem in March of 2001 that half the people don't think that George Bush is running the administration. For two reasons: One, the people they think are running it whether it's Dick Cheney or Colin Powell and his area, or whatever, are seen as competent, responsible people. If they were anonymous sort of non-entities, I think that would be a problem but they have their own independent reputations Jim, however, going back to the CO-2 and going back to the tax cut to the degree that George Bush is not seen as a strong and forceful figure and that other forces and other interests large, well healed, well connected interests are influencing policy, that becomes policy. If a year from now the numbers are the same, then George Bush's presidency is in trouble.

JIM LEHRER: How do you analyze it?

PAUL GIGOT: It is only a problem if it lasts I think a long time or people do get the sense somehow that he is not in control. Everybody -- every President does have to look in command and in control. You know, I think this White House has been pursuing a strategy which is we're not going to put him out very often, and if you look at what Bill Clinton did in his first few months, contrasted with George Bush in just terms of number of public appearances, number of TV interviews, bringing people -- the anchors -- through the White House, the first lady and so on -- it has been a really much different strategy. Maybe it's time to ratchet it up a bit if people don't think he is in control.

JIM LEHRER: Last subject. Campaign finance reform gets its big moment or two weeks at least in the Senate sun beginning on Monday. The news stories say, oh, wait a minute, it may suddenly be in trouble. What is your reading of it?

PAUL GIGOT: Well, suddenly it might pass, Jim, and when something might pass, the charade that we have been having the last few years here where all the reformers, boy, this is just a terrific idea, we're going to vote for this and that it would pass completely except for Darth Vader, Mitch McConnell, the Republican filibuster. Suddenly now McConnell has removed his filibuster threat. We're going to get a real debate, which is encouraging and good, but a lot of people for reform are suddenly discovering....

JIM LEHRER: A lot of Democrats.

PAUL GIGOT: Particularly Democrats...maybe it wasn't such a good idea...the AFL-CIO notably has come out against half of the McCain-Feingold reform and a lot of Democrats, John Breaux broke this week, the Louisiana Democrat, because - you know what -- in soft money now they've caught up to the Republicans.

JIM LEHRER: What is going on, Mark?

MARK SHIELDS: Jim, I think there is skittishness; I think there's some nervousness. I think Paul makes a reasonable point here about you vote for something as a symbol and you get all the pluses and it never becomes law and you never have to live by it. John Breaux, let's get one thing straight, I like John Breaux enormously - John Breaux five times voted for McCain-Feingold in the past. When the hearings began, Fred Thompson chaired on the abuses of the 1996 Presidential campaign that Senator Thompson of Tennessee chaired, John Breaux said we're going to have hearings like this unless and until we abolish soft money. Now I think that John Breaux of Louisiana, special case, but I think the Democrats will stick. Mitch McConnell's argument that this is going to somehow help the Democrats I don't think is borne out by what Paul just cited. The Democrats caught up in soft money. I think that the soft money has become so total, so dominant in our system when, Jim you have 800 individual institutions giving two-thirds of the $ 296 million in soft money last year, that is outrageous.

JIM LEHRER: We will resume this conversation next week. Thank you both very much.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: And again, the major stories of this Friday: Wall Street had another bad day, ending a dismal week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down 207 points at 9823. And the NASDAQ was down 49 points at 1890. And commandos stormed a hijacked Russian plane in Medina, Saudi Arabia, freeing more than 100 hostages. And in saying good night now for the weekend, a special obituary notice. It's for Monica "Niki" Hoose, who died here in Washington last night after a long illness. She was one of the first employees of this program when we began 25 years ago. She started as my secretary, and went on to be a political reporter, a studio senior producer, and finally, until she became seriously ill a few months ago, a documentary producer. We, her friends and colleagues, will miss her, and in another way, so will you, our audience. Niki was only 48 years old.