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FACE THE NATION

Sunday, March 21, 2004

GUESTS: HOWARD DEAN Former Democratic Presidential Candidate

Senator RICHARD LUGAR, (R-IN) Chairman, Foreign Relations Committee

KAREN TUMULTY Time Magazine

MODERATOR: BOB SCHIEFFER - CBS News

This is a rush transcript provided for the information and convenience of the press. Accuracy is not guaranteed. In case of doubt, please check with

FACE THE NATION - CBS NEWS 202-457-4481

BURRELLE'S INFORMATION SERVICES / 202-419-1859 / 800-456-2877 Face the Nation (CBS News) - Sunday, March 21, 2004 1

BOB SCHIEFFER, host:

Today on FACE THE NATION, is the election coming down to what happens in Iraq? Have the terrorist attacks in Spain redefined the coming presidential campaign here? Does it put new pressure on the president to explain why we invaded Iraq, or does it put new importance on the president's claims that John Kerry is weak on defense? We'll ask the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Republican Richard Lugar, and former Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean, who is expected to endorse Kerry this week. Karen Tumulty of Time magazine joins in the questioning.

Then this week's 50th anniversary FACE THE NATION Flashback will focus on the Watergate plumbers. Finally, I'll have a word about what the terrorists need to know about our coming election. But first, Howard Dean and Richard Lugar on FACE THE NATION.

Announcer: FACE THE NATION, with CBS News chief Washington correspondent Bob Schieffer. And now from CBS News in Washington, Bob Schieffer.

SCHIEFFER: Good morning again. Joining us from Burlington, Vermont, this morning, Howard Dean; in the studio with us, Senator Richard Lugar. Karen Tumulty of Time magazine is here for the questioning. We're going to begin with Governor Dean.

Governor, thank you for coming this morning.

Dr. HOWARD DEAN (Former Democratic Presidential Candidate): Thanks, Bob.

SCHIEFFER: People in John Kerry's high command are letting it be known that they have not--have not--dismissed the idea of considering John McCain as a running mate. Now they're not going to make an announcement that that's going on, but people close to that campaign tell me that they're thinking about it. They're going to sound out advisers, other people, to see what they think about it, the bottom line being that in their minds the possibility of John McCain as a running mate for Senator Kerry is--is still alive and is still operating.

Tom Oliphant, the columnist for The Boston Globe who probably has as many sources within the Kerry campaign as anybody I know, is laying out the reasons that it would be good to consider John McCain. So I begin by asking you: Do you think that's a good idea?

Dr. DEAN: Well, I--I generally do not give advice to presidential candidates about running mates or anything else in public, and I don't intend to break that president--that precedent today. I think John Kerry's got to--going to pick a running mate who who's going to serve us honorably. I'm very open-minded about who that may be. I don't have a--a list of criteria in my mind that I--I certainly am going to support John Kerry no matter who he picks as a running mate, and Senator McCain's a fine person. I think that would be a very interesting choice but I'm sure he's going very carefully through his list, and I'm going to leave it at that.

SCHIEFFER: But if--if he did select Senator McCain, you would still be able to support him?

Dr. DEAN: Absolutely. Senator McCain and I differ on i--i--issues such as abortion, and I think that's a critical issue. We probably have some other differences as well. But he's well- respected, and I'm interested in--in ch--in sending this president back to Crawford, Texas. He has done more damage to this country than anybody probably since Warren Harding or Herbert Hoover. We have a huge $1/2 trillion deficit. We're bogged down in a war in Iraq where the administration, even the secretary of Defense on your program last week, wasn't BURRELLE'S INFORMATION SERVICES / (202)419-1859 / (800)456-2877 Face the Nation (CBS News) - Sunday, March 21, 2004 2 truthful about why we're there. We need a change, and I'm willing to do whatever I can to get that change, and electing John Kerry is how we're going to get that change.

SCHIEFFER: Karen?

Ms. KAREN TUMULTY (Time Magazine): So, Governor, this week you will be endorsing John Kerry. You are throwing your efforts now into getting him elected, and yet one of the first things you did on his behalf was to issue a statement that the campaign immediately had to repudiate. You said the president was the one who dragged our troops to Iraq, which apparently has been a factor in the death of 200 Spaniards over the weekend. Of course, no one's going to say that there's any justification for terrorism but do you, in fact, think that Spain would have been the target of that bombing had it not supported the United States in the--in the Iraq war?

Dr. DEAN: First of all, we were not repudiated by John Kerry. That was a story created by some overanxious print journalists who had a too--a little too much time on their hands, and they fell for the old gag. I said what you said I said. I said that I did--that the terrorists themselves gave the reason for the attack on Spain for the fact that Spain had participated in the war in Iraq. That's their reasoning, which is what I said. The White House then put out a characterization of what I said which was not accurate. The print journalists rushed to John Kerry, who didn't know what I had said, and asked him to respond to the White House press releases.

It was a--it was a--it was a typical `gotcha' silly journalism, and John Kerry, in fact, said that's not my position in response to something that the White House had said. So the story is ridiculous, and what you just said happened didn't happen.

Now to get to the matter at hand, the important matter is the terrorists in their videotape said that they had attacked Spain because of the Spanish participation in the Iraq war. They also said they had done it because of the Spanish kicked the Moors out of the country in 1492. So you know, terrorism are--is terrorism. Terrorists use all kinds of self-justifications to kill people, but those are the reasons they gave.

SCHIEFFER: It seems to me, Governor, that John Kerry, if he's gonna have a problem, the problem is that he has not been entirely consis--consis--consistent with the--in the positions he has taken. The White House will tell you that he has voted on all sides of almost every issue, and that is obviously campaign overstatement, but this week he did say, when asked why he voted against the $87 billion to fund the war in Iraq, he actually said on the record, `I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.'

Dr. DEAN: Well, you know, that's...

SCHIEFFER: How does the campaign handle this kind of thing?

Dr. DEAN: Well, you know, I was in trouble for saying things like that. The fact is here's what really happened. What really happened was that John Kerry took a position that I took, which is that the president had no business asking us for $87 billion to add to the deficit in our children's and grandchildren's debt loads without paying for it. And John Kerry said, `If you're gonna--if you believe in this, then pay for it. Cut back on your tax cut for the people who make a million dollars a year.' President evidently didn't think the $87 billion was important enough to pay for it, so John Kerry voted against it when it came to the final vote. I thought that was the right thing to do, that John Kerry did. He is being subjected to the same kind of silly journalism that I was subjected to, and of course the Republican National Committee is egging this on in their ads which are, of course, inaccurate as... BURRELLE'S INFORMATION SERVICES / (202)419-1859 / (800)456-2877 Face the Nation (CBS News) - Sunday, March 21, 2004 3

Ms. TUMULTY: But...

SCHIEFFER: Wait...

Dr. DEAN: ...many campaigns--ads are on both sides. So this is a--you know, should John have said this? Knowing what the journalists were gonna do to it, perhaps not.

SCHIEFFER: Well...

Dr. DEAN: But the truth is, he accurately represented his votes. You all took it out of context and the RNC put it in an ad.

SCHIEFFER: Well, the fact is that you often accused him of being inconsistent yourself during the campaign, did you not?

Dr. DEAN: Ye...

SCHIEFFER: Which leads me to this. You're now gonna endorse him this week. There are a lot of your followers who were not too keen on John Kerry. How are you gonna convince them to--for the sake of unity, to come together and now support the person that they were against during the primaries?

Dr. DEAN: Well, I ran for three reasons. I had three goals. One was to send George Bush back to Crawford, Texas, so we could have jobs back in this country and we--so we can resume the position of moral leadership in the world which we've held since World War I. Two was to reform the Democratic Party so never again will they lay down and die in front of the right wing of the Republican Party. We don't compromise with right-wingers. We stand up against them because they don't believe in American values. And three was to become president of the United States.

I will not be president of the United States in 2004, so the question is: How do you meet your first two goals? The first two goals are to elect a Democratic president. John Kerry--my choice between John Kerry and George Bush. John Kerry is strong on the environment. He's much stronger on defense than George Bush is. George Bush and John--Don--and Dick Cheney and Dons Rum--Don Rumsfeld collectively have never served a day overseas in their entire lives. They don't mind sending people to die. George--John Kerry has three Purple Hearts and a Silver Star after meritorious service in Vietnam. There's a guy I trust to defend the United States of America and go after the right enemy, not the wrong enemy. So John Kerry is a clearly better choice for president of the United States than George Bush. I'll have no trouble endorsing John Kerry this week.

SCHIEFFER: OK. All right. Karen, final question.

Ms. TUMULTY: Well, so--is there something, though, that he has to do to bring along your supporters, because they were making--if you read the blog from your campaign, they were making a lot of those same criticisms themselves during the--during the campaign. What does Kerry need to do to bring along your supporters?

Dr. DEAN: Well, you know, John and I have talked about that and that, again, will be a private matter of advice between myself and--and Senator Kerry. But we do all agree that we desperately need a Democrat to be president of the United States. We're gonna work hard for that, and I'm gonna encourage John to do some things that are gonna appeal to my constituency, because we need everybody, all hands on deck in order to send the president BURRELLE'S INFORMATION SERVICES / (202)419-1859 / (800)456-2877 Face the Nation (CBS News) - Sunday, March 21, 2004 4 back to Crawford, Texas, where he should enjoy a very lengthy retirement.

SCHIEFFER: All right. Well, on that, Governor, we'll say thank you very much.

And we'll get somewhat a different story, I suspect, from Richard Lugar, who is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a Republican.

Let me begin, Senator Lugar, by asking you about something that John McCain said this week. Now the administration, it is clear, is gonna go after John Kerry as being weak on defense. That's what all their commercials seem to indicate. That's what the president is talking about. John McCain, a Republican, member of your party, said, `Wait a minute. John Kerry may be many things, but he's not weak on defense,' and he said he should not be criticized for that. You have probably worked with John Kerry on the Foreign Relations Committee longer than John McCain has known him, and I would ask you this: Do you agree with John McCain or do you agree with the characterization of Kerry that has been made by the vice president and the president?

Senator RICHARD LUGAR (Republican, Indiana; Senate Foreign Relations Committee): Well, John Kerry has t--two difficult problems, as I see it. He has been a valued member of the Foreign Relations Committee. I look forward to welcoming him back to the committee to continue working with us. But in running for president, he has run up against Governor Dean. And Governor Dean has energized Democrats. In fact, energized them so much that one public poll shows 75 percent of Democrats plan to vote against Bush. It doesn't matter who the nominee might be. Governor Dean had the misfortune that ultimately he was not the person having energized the forces that Democrats pragmatically thought might be the spear carrier. But Senator Kerry has real problem as to how to keep energized all that group that Governor Dean has out there who dislike the president intensely--and that probably understates it--and the war.

SCHIEFFER: But--but do you--do you think that the administration is being fair when they call him being weak on defense? Do you agree with that?

Sen. LUGAR: Well, I--I'm saying that--is that Senator Kerry has also the second problem, that is a voting record, and it's fair game to point out the votes that he has cast with regard to defense measures, intelligence measures, defense appropriations, whatever, throughout the years. In this particular case, he has the problem, on the one hand, of--of trying to--to mollify some of the center of the electorate in order to win the election, and hang on to the people who supported Governor Dean who are rabid in that respect. And that's a problem candidates have. But since he has sort of fallen into this after Governor Dean was not the choice, having gotten everybody revved up, he has a problem. And--and he's going to have it throughout the campaign of attempting to show as--as President Bush says, `I am a strong war leader. I'm against terrorism. We're going the route,' as he told the diplomats in the White House Friday. And no--no falling back, and what have you.

SCHIEFFER: Well...

Sen. LUGAR: And Kerry will say, `Well, now we've got to listen to our allies, to the United Nations, to all sorts of people,' which always is going to blunt that situation.

SCHIEFFER: Do you think Senator Kerry thinks that terrorism is not a serious threat to this country? Do you believe that if he became president he would back away from the war on terrorism?

Sen. LUGAR: I have no idea how Senator Kerry would fight the war on terrorism. I say that BURRELLE'S INFORMATION SERVICES / (202)419-1859 / (800)456-2877 Face the Nation (CBS News) - Sunday, March 21, 2004 5 advisedly. I--I have not heard really how he roots out the cells of al-Qaida, embedded as they are in apparently tens of countries, maybe only loosely affiliated with Osama bin Laden, how he keeps the terrorists away from weapons or materials of mass destruction, which is really, in my judgment, the--the foreign policy question of our time, in essence really how he fights any war at this particular point. He--what he's attempting to say is he would be more multinational, he would be more cooperative and congenial, he would penet--pay more attention with international institutes. Those are all good objectives. How that meets, however, the people who killed the Spaniards or the folks that killed us, really doesn't add up at this point. And he'll have to say more.

SCHIEFFER: Karen.

Ms. TUMULTY: There's been a lot of criticism that the administration did not plan well enough, did not plan enough for this postwar period. We're now moving into another phase on June 30th. Do you think that the administration has planned well enough for the phase of after we turn over Iraq to the Iraqis? Has the diplomatic planning been done enough? For instance, have they thought about who they want for ambassador to Iraq on the moment that they're going to have to open basically the biggest embassy in the world?

Sen. LUGAR: Well, Karen, I'm pressing exactly the same questions because they are critical. That ambassador and the size of that embassy are a tr--a tremendous change in our diplomacy. And it's going to happen very soon. And as I have told people at the White House, you need an American icon to fulfill that position. But we need to know pretty soon. Now--now secondly, there isn't a very good strategy for what happens from July 1 to let's say the end of the year when perhaps elections will be held, if the group, whether it's the Governing Council, an extension of that, some other arrangement finally finds some election rules. Now all of that is still to be done.

Now having said that, Jerry Bremer and his people have done a remarkable job, as has the Governing Council, in fashioning a constitutional law that talks truthfully about freedom of religion, about women occupying 25 percent of the slots in the legislature, about a whole lot of distribution of oil moneys that seemed impossible, a degree of autonomy for the Kurds that might be acceptable. These are very big compromises. And--and so even though there are questions that need to be raised and answered like our ambassador and how do we do the embassy, how do we stand that up, how do we phase out Bremer and so forth? Hopefully people are thinking about that. And--and we have some responsibility in the Senate to push that.

SCHIEFFER: Well...

Ms. TUMULTY: Hopefully people are thinking about that? Are--are--you're the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. You're--you don't know for sure whether people in the White House are thinking about that?

Sen. LUGAR: Well, I have not seen the plans so I--I--I just say that candidly. Senator Biden and I pressed for planning before we got to that point. The day after the fighting, we had all sorts of witnesses that gave us a pretty good indication, and the American people, through C- SPAN, of precisely what was going to occur. Now there is no need for that to happen again. And we have at least three good months to pin this down. And it's going to require administration and Senate and House cooperation.

SCHIEFFER: Now, Senator, you said just a while ago that you thought that Kerry would-- would press for a more international kind of effort. If I know you, you're an internationalist, don't you think--or do you believe that there should be more of an international cooperation BURRELLE'S INFORMATION SERVICES / (202)419-1859 / (800)456-2877 Face the Nation (CBS News) - Sunday, March 21, 2004 6 here?

Sen. LUGAR: Of course. And I was at the White House to hear the president, the only senator on Friday. And I shook hands with about every one of the 83 ambassadors who were there and tried to have a personal word, as did the president. It is very, very important when we talk about 83 countries coming together, that we mean it; that we do everything we can. Some of them put their agendas--we're going to have to think about Angola, the African agenda, this week in our committee, for example. We're talking about the Law of the Sea Treaty, which ties us up finely in ways that our CNO, our chief of naval operations, wants-- naval security. No, that's different. These are not issues that may be front-burner for everybody, but they have a lot to do with international cooperation and views of the United States and young people in these countries, their views, of us which are critically important.

SCHIEFFER: Do you think that the fact that what happened in Spain increases the possibility that there will be a terrorist attack in this country?

Sen. LUGAR: Doesn't increase it, but I have no idea what the al-Qaida plans are. I hope that the cooperation we're now getting between the FBI and CIA, plus homeland defense and all the other situations that have come together since 9/11, have, in fact, made that less possible. And I think that is the case. I think money has been dried up. Organizational things are more difficult. But we have a long way to go with European cooperation. Europeans met this week as a group, not with us. This is after Spain. We--we should have been together talking about how all of us deal with the al-Qaida.

Ms. TUMULTY: But that...

Sen. LUGAR: Hopefully we will get together. But Europeans have to be willing to ask us to come to some of the meetings, too.

Ms. TUMULTY: But does the fact that al-Qaida, or whoever was behind these attacks in Spain, seems to have influenced an election as a result of it--does that make it more tempting for them to try to do the same thing here?

Sen. LUGAR: Well, I don't think they're going to affect our election. But I would say that they might very well try on for size various other countries if they thought that was of value. And that needs to be met head-on. In other words, European countries need to say to the new Spanish prime minister, `Come off of it. We are together in Europe. Now hopefully we can get together with the United States.'

SCHIEFFER: All right. We have to leave it there, Senator. Thank you so much.

We'll be back with another 50th anniversary Flashback in just a minute.

(Announcements)

SCHIEFFER: George Meany was one of the most powerful figures in the history of the American labor movement and one of Richard Nixon's most vocal critics. And he minced no words when he came to this broadcast 30 years ago this month. That is our FACE THE NATION 50th anniversary Flashback.

President RICHARD M. NIXON: I had no prior knowledge of a Watergate break-in.

SCHIEFFER: Watergate had plunged the Nixon administration into the worst White House crisis of modern times. By March of 1974, the first of the Watergate indictments had been BURRELLE'S INFORMATION SERVICES / (202)419-1859 / (800)456-2877 Face the Nation (CBS News) - Sunday, March 21, 2004 7 handed down, and the White House aides who had been illegally spying on Americans to plug news leaks had become known as the plumbers. That alone was enough to irritate Meany, the longtime leader of the AFL-CIO.

(Excerpt from vintage FACE THE NATION)

Unidentified Man: I understand you regard that as a libel.

Mr. GEORGE MEANY: Yes, I do re--I--I--I think it's a--it's a libel. It's against hundreds of thousands of people in this country who follow a very honest, decent profession, the plumbers of this country. And I don't--I--I think they should have called it--the newspapers should have called it the White House felons rather than the White House plumbers.

SCHIEFFER: The newspapers didn't cooperate on that, but in a little over five months, Nixon would be gone and Gerald Ford would be president. George Meany would remain as a powerful force in America for years to come, another FACE THE NATION 50th anniversary Flashback.

And I'll be back with a final word.

(Announcements)

SCHIEFFER: Finally today, wartime elections are nothing new for this country. We held one during the Civil War, the only nation ever to do so and, in 1944, during World War II, Republicans waged such a vigorous campaign against Franklin Roosevelt, he feared he would lose. Democracies understand what elections are about; the terrorists may not, and that is why I believe the president and John Kerry should take an extraordinary step.

The president's running as a war president; Kerry is a critic of how the war is being run. Fine, that's what elections should be about. But when the Spanish government fell after terrorist bombings there and the new government announced immediately it would remove its troops from Iraq, that had to encourage the terrorists. That leaves us at a dangerous moment, perhaps the most dangerous moment since 9/11.

So here is what I propose. Kerry and the president should hold a joint news conference. Kerry should reiterate that whatever their differences, he agrees with the president that terrorism threatens our way of life, that he will not allow terrorists to intimidate America and, if elected, he will never back away from the fight against them. The president should then say that on this issue he takes the senator at his word. Then the two of them should campaign across the country debating the only question about terrorism that matters: the best way to defeat it.

The terrorists must draw only one conclusion from our election: Whoever wins, they lose.

That's it for us. We'll see you right here next week on FACE THE NATION.

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