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| SHIELDS AND BROOKS | |
 September 20, 2002  |
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Mark Shields and David Brooks discuss possible military action against Iraq, the chances of a new U.N. resolution, and the mid-term elections.
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JIM LEHRER: And finally tonight, the analysis of Shields and Brooks. Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and David Brooks of the "Weekly Standard." On Iraq, is the president going to get the resolution he wants, David? |
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| Will Congress support the president? | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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DAVID BROOKS: Almost. There might be some restrictions on the geography of it, limiting it to Iraq but he is going to get overwhelming support I think, 80 percent. And it is kind of amazing. Ten years ago the Democratic Party overwhelmingly opposed resolution to use force to reverse an invasion.
Then September 11, which has changed all our mentalities and then Tom Daschle. Now I'm not sure Tom Daschle has a sophisticated foreign policy set of views but he knows politically he wants to get this passed and over with. JIM LEHRER: Your analysis. MARK SHIELDS: Jim, I think there's probably around four dozen House Democrats who will oppose it right now. And I don't see that group growing in a big way.
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| The Democrats' strategy | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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JIM LEHRER: Why? What happened? Do you agree with David about what happened? MARK SHIELDS: I think David's analysis, as always, is intriguing. I don't think it's necessarily politically explains what's going on. There's a wonderful Washington rule, and the rule goes that on any issue I'd rather have one tiger than a hundred pussycats on your side. And George Bush, whatever else he is, has been a tiger on this; he's been insistent, he's been relentless. And he is also playing to his strength, which is commander in chief and that is strictly post-September 11, because nobody saw him as a commander in chief going into September 11th, going into the last election, but that experience and his resoluteness afterwards made him that. And so here he is at 67 percent approval -- the Democrats in a very tight election.
We want to get the conversation, we want to switch the subject back to the subject of health care and Social Security and, Jim, let's be very blunt about this: Is George Bush doing it because of the election in November 5? No. Is there anybody in the White House who is unaware of the fact that there are six weeks remaining in a campaign in which no Republican can run on Bush's record domestically? Two million jobs lost, $4.5 trillion gone from the stock market, shenanigans in the CEO's that is just a shock to the country, you know, two million people had jobs to go to when Bush was President, sworn in, don't have jobs to go to Monday morning. No, they can't. But they can run on George Bush as commander in chief is a far more popular figure than a steward of the economy. DAVID BROOKS: I would say we may be about to go to war, lose lives. And the fact that Tom Daschle wants to change the subject to prescription drug benefits for his political benefit is just running around Capitol Hill looking for some sand to stick your head in. Iraq what is we should be talking about. Tom Daschle and Democrats should not be trying to change the subject. They should frankly have a more substantive view on the subject. JIM LEHRER: So the national debate is over? The one we've talked about here that we were going to have?
Now if you look at the polls, there has been a complete flip on the percentage of people who think Bush has made the case. Now a clear majority think he has made the case. The world is more friendly. His approvals have shot back up again to about 70%. He is going to roll through the Congress with this resolution. It is an amazing run he has had. The landscape has been transformed. What happened? We really don't know. |
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| Politics and foreign policy | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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JIM LEHRER: Based on what I've just heard the two of you say, what you're saying is it's the Democrats fault, they've run for cover for political reasons and what you're saying is well, maybe it wasn't the reason for all of this, but the White House is the one that's benefiting politically because of it? MARK SHIELDS: The White House is benefiting politically, let's been very blunt about that. I'm not saying it is the sole motivation by any means or any reason. But Jim, I mean, if you listen to it, if you listen to it, does the administration, is it pushing for war? There is no question about it. David is absolutely right. I mean, the Democrats have been the cowardly lions. I mean, I have yet to see them.
MARK SHIELDS: These are crucial questions that are not being asked. I mean you know, the tragedy of Vietnam, and there were several thousand, one of which was let's ask questions next time on the way in, not have recriminations on the way out. Once again we're going to war with those at peril divorced from those at policy. Let's be very frank about that. There aren't going to be any mothers staying up late on Capitol Hill because their sons are over there. That's one; second, Jim, being frank, who is going to pay for it? This is an administration Jack Kennedy said pay any price, bear any burden. This is an administration that won't even ask Jack Welsh or Donald Trump to forgo their tax cut for the war. I mean, what are we going to do afterwards? Who is going to be with us? Are we going to be the first western Christian pro-Israeli occupying force, military occupying force of an Arab nation in that region? JIM LEHRER: There's about 12 questions there, David. DAVID BROOKS: I'd say they're all irrelevant. I'll try to be intriguing. The crucial issue is: are the risks of going in greater or less than the risks of not going in? The people who don't want to go in have to accept the fact they're going to produce a world in which Saddam Hussein continues to have weapons of mass destruction, continues to cement the political climate in the Middle East.
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| The U.N. and the U.S. stance on Iraq | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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JIM LEHRER: Now what about the U.N. issue? A week ago it looked one way. Then suddenly, Saddam Hussein said okay, come on, you can have the inspectors back. What happened? In about 48 hours it went from one thing to another, looked like the U.N. was going to do it and then Saddam Hussein does his thing and then it come back to Congress. Follow that. Follow that for me. DAVID BROOKS: Well, he first said unconditionally you can let me in, so there was sort of a pause. Then suddenly the conditions came in. Then you got more comments from the inspectors themselves, the former inspectors -- David Kay and the others who said you have got 250 people searching a country the size of California. The prospects of them actually finding anything over any period of time are just remote. And so you had stories in the "New York Times" quoting these inspectors saying it is a nearly impossible task. So I think there has been a feeling that inspectors is not the solution.
MARK SHIELDS: It did. Let me just reject David's last argument for this reason. This started off after September 11 that Saddam Hussein was tied to September 11, and he was a friend of al-Qaida. All right, there's no evidence to support that. I mean hawkish Democrats, Marine veterans of Vietnam like Jack Murtha, a solid supporter, say there is absolutely no intelligence to suggest that there's any imminent peril to the United States. We go to the U.N., the President goes to the U.N. and says Saddam Hussein has disrespected the U.N. Why? Because he hasn't let inspectors in. Saddam Hussein says, okay, I'll let inspectors in; inspectors…"no, no don't go any good." This is an administration that won't take yes for an answer. I mean, you know, there's question about that. Whatever he said -- the difference between this and the Cuban Missile Crisis is so often. I mean, Kennedy chose to take that more mollified. You say, yes we're going to take it and we're going to go in and we're going to inspect and we're going to inspect robustly and it's going to be in charge of it; Americans are going to be in charge of the inspection team and we are going to go through this entire country. And if you don't do it under the U.N. agreement, then you know, you are in violation. What is wrong with that, Jim, instead of sending people in to be killed? JIM LEHRER: David. DAVID BROOKS: What I would suggest anybody seriously interested in this issue find on the Web is Donald Rumsfeld's written testimony from this week; it's the best administration summary of what is wrong with Saddam Hussein.
There is nobody in Iraq that's, you know, rebutting him. There's no parliament to overrule him. He's an insane megalomaniac figure who could do horrible things to him. JIM LEHRER: So the inspections -- so you agree the President has done the right thing; forget the inspections -- reject it, forget it and don't even play it out? DAVID BROOKS: The Iraqi regime is already putting conditions on the inspectors. They kicked them out when they got close to things before. I just don't think it can work after ten years of trying. MARK SHIELDS: Jim, to quote Tom Friedman, someone I think we all respect. Saddam Hussein is homicidal yes, but he's not suicidal. Over the last 11 years we have been told and I believe that the United States has grown stronger in military. He has grown weaker militarily. What is the charge? The charge is he has these weapons of mass destruction. Now, Jim, he hasn't used them in the past 11 years. He has been contained. What we are saying and quoting Donald Rumsfeld, David's principal authority this week, he said we are going to have to send in ground troops. Now we are going to send in ground troops, no inspections, no nothing, saying we're coming after you. That means (a), he is going to be deposed and (b), he is going to be dead. Do you think that might be an incentive to use those chemical weapons? DAVID BROOKS: Let me -- let me mention, Mark mentioned Tom Friedman. He actually had an interesting column, which is something I agree with and I think was a mistake the Bush administration's made. Friedman said "I'm not even most concerned beside weapons of mass destruction. What I'm concerned about is the political climate in the Middle East." And Friedman said the reason I think we need to depose Saddam Hussein is because we cannot let another generation of young men in that region grow up without any hope and then being sucked into the sort of extremism that some of them have been sucked into. And therefore it is necessary to change the political climate. I think that argument has been underplayed by the Bush Administration. And as for whether Saddam is in the box, I think that's the best argument, Madeleine Albright made it. We would have thought Osama bin Laden was in the box because he didn't want to commit suicide. Saddam Hussein when you read about him is a guy who wants to be remembered a thousand years from now as someone who was a grand historical figure. We don't know what that guy is going to do.
I mean if in fact he insists upon it and demands it and there is uncovered -- Jim, the last inspections before he barred them, we uncovered more and destroyed more chemical weapons than we did in the entire war against him. I mean inspections did work. I mean I think there is a case to be made. And I just don't understand this rush to war. DAVID BROOKS: This is the last resort. We've had an embargo on the guy for ten years. We've had eight rounds of inspections; we've had I don't know how many U.N. resolutions. We have been down this route so often. JIM LEHRER: Maybe the Congress isn't going to debate this, but we'll do it here, I guess. Thank you both very much. |
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Ten
years later, they're going to overwhelmingly support a resolution against
Saddam Hussein when he hasn't invaded anybody, to change his regime.
It's an amazing shift in the Democratic Party. And I think a couple
things have happened. One, Clinton has gotten the Democratic Party used
to the humanitarian use of force. 
And
I think -- and you always have to stipulate that people are not operating
from just the most base and venal of motives. And I'm not suggesting
that. But I think there is a calculation, as David is right, on the
part of many Democrats, that look, this is not a winner for us in this
campaign. 
DAVID
BROOKS: Didn't happen. The Iraqi army puts up more resistance. I mean,
look at the run George Bush has had over the last couple of weeks --
two weeks ago or two, three, four weeks ago -- the administration was
divided, the world was hostile; the country was skeptical. 
JIM
LEHRER: But why? 
To
me, many people who are against the war, they have all sorts of issues
they talk about, whether Bush is corrupt, corporate class, whether we
should go to the U.N. But the only issue that really matters is what
is more dangerous for us. And if you're against Bush going in, you have
to say it's acceptable, the status quo is acceptable. Saddam Hussein
is acceptable the way he is. 
JIM
LEHRER: But what happened, Mark, because the inspectors issue froze
things there for about, it seemed like about 24 hours then boom it all
went away again. 
When
you read through it, the whole litany of horrible things he has done,
the incredible effort he has put to these weapons of mass destruction,
when you go back and realize that when we do these war games of what
happens when there's a chemical attack on this country, you get a million
dead or a biological attack, three million sick within a period of a
few months, and you have to say looking at this guy and his history
and his character, the megalomania, do we want to risk that number of
people based on the fact that Saddam Hussein got up on the same side
of the bed that morning? 
MARK
SHIELDS: Jim, I just -- I simply say war should not be the first resort;
it has to be the last resort. And I think you pursue the United Nations,
if you are talking about the United Nations, I think you have to go
through the inspections route. 
