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April 03, 2006

Special Report Roundtable - April 3

FOX News Special Report With Brit Hume

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CONDOLEEZZA RICE, SECRETARY OF STATE: Needs to be a strong leader, who is a unifying force and someone who can bring stability and meet the challenges that face the Iraqi people, but it is not our job to say who that person is going to be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIT HUME, HOST: But neither Condoleezza Rice nor her counterpart, Jack Straw from Britain, are saying that it ought to be Ibraham al-Jaafari, who is the interim head of Iraq.

Now, some analytical observations from Fred Barnes, executive editor of The Weekly Standard, Bill Sammon, senior White House correspondent of The Washington Examiner, and Mara Liasson, national political correspondent of National Public Radio. FOX News contributors all.

Well, what about this, and this effort that was made over the weekend by Rice and Straw to put pressure there, surprise visit, and what -- and what's at stake?

BILL SAMMON, WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Well, I think they want to get the Iraqi government off the dime. I mean, it's been basically paralyzed since the elections in December, and I think they want to get Jaafari out of there, but they can't come out and say that, because they have to respect...

HUME: What's the gripe about him?

SAMMON: The gripe is that although he was nominated to be prime minister, he hasn't assembled a two-thirds majority to get the permanent government up and running so he can appoint all the other ministers. He doesn't have enough support from the Kurdish or the Sunni base. She has got the largest Shiite base that nominated him, but that's not enough.

The second step is to form the permanent government. He hasn't been able to do that, and weeks are going by. And Rice and Straw are saying, look, we need somebody who can get enough support to actually start a government. We don't want to specifically say Jaafari should step down, but that's the implied message.

MARA LIASSON, NPR: Oh, I think it's -- in private, I think it's more than implied. I mean, you talked to -- we talked to some top administration officials. They are pretty clear, he is weak. As one said, we want someone who has some steel up his backside, and they would prefer it not be him. Now...

HUME: Who do they want?

LIASSON: I don't know who they want. I mean, I think they would take one of these other guys. Mahdi is one of them, who is an alternative.

Jaafari himself has come out and complained bitterly that our ambassador there is openly...

HUME: Working against him.

LIASSON: ... working against him, so he has made no secret of it. He does have the support of Muqtada al-Sadr, who is this guy...

HUME: Renegade cleric, as he is called.

LIASSON: Renegade cleric.

HUME: Yes.

LIASSON: Who has an armed, very large armed militia that the U.S. has clashed with in the past, and the question is when will this be resolved and will it be resolved peacefully?

FRED BARNES, WEEKLY STANDARD: You know, the problem with Jaafari is, as almost anyone in the upper reaches of the Bush administration will tell you, that he is weak and compromised. You know, he is not -- he shows no leadership capability whatsoever, and he is compromised because of Sadr. That's the only reason -- he was chosen by one vote as the Shiite Alliance's candidate to be prime minister in this new permanent government. One vote. And it's clear from what -- from what both Rice and Jack Straw said just today over there in Iraq, that they want Ayatollah Sistani to step in and say something that will allow Jaafari -- to get Jaafari out of there, and something like Mahdi -- although if you talk to the people in the Bush administration, they can name three or four people whose names I can't repeat, but three or four people who they would rather have in there than Jaafari. And they are pushing hard behind the scenes. And it isn't - - well, because they think -- I don't know that it's entirely right -- that the insurgency without a permanent government there, the insurgency will continue to worsen in Baghdad.

SAMMON: But that's one of the reasons that the Bush administration doesn't like Jaafari, is because he has Sadr as part of his critical backing...

BARNES: Yes, exactly.

SAMMON: ... and Sadr has got this militia which has battled the U.S. military twice in 2004. And as Condi said today, she wants to get rid of the militias. She wants to get rid of the influence of the militias. And here they are dealing with a guy -- now, the other side of that is if Condi and the Bush administration succeeds in marginalizing Jaafari, there is a concern that Sadr's militia will retaliate again.

LIASSON: Look, Sadr is a power broker no matter who he decides to back. And he is in the parliament. He is a power broker anyway. I never have gotten the impression that somehow he is invested in Jaafari no matter what. He was the kingmaker in that deal, and who knows, he might be able to wield that role again.

BARNES: No, no, he doesn't have to be a power broker at all. If you have the Kurds and you have some Sunnis and you have a majority of the Shiite Alliance, you have a unity government. That's what you want. You want Sadr out of there. And you particularly don't want somebody beholden to him, which Jaafari is.

HUME: What about Iran? Is Iran thought to be influential with Jaafari?

BARNES: Well, Sadr has been over to Iran, but then so have a lot of these leaders. You know, one of the things in the background that you have to remember is -- a lot of these -- or some, not a lot -- but some of these Shiites were protected by the Iranians during -- and had -- were in exile in Iran during the Saddam Hussein years.

So, although they -- look, the most important person is Sistani, the Ayatollah Sistani, a Shiite mullah, and he is for democracy, as all -- as are almost all of the others are. I don't know about Sadr, but all the rest are, and that's the important thing. They don't want a cleric-run government as there is in Iran.

HUME: So is this going to work in your judgment, Bill?

SAMMON: I don't think so, because Jaafari is not only...

HUME: No, no, I mean, do you think that this effort to diminish his influence and push this group toward forming a government is going to work?

SAMMON: I think it is, because you are already seeing some Shiites backing away from Jaafari. So he is losing support within Iraqis' government, but he is also losing international support, as evidenced by Straw and Rice going over there and very -- making it very clear that they would rather him not be the guy.

HUME: What leverage, though, does the U.S. really have? I mean, we can't say we are going to pull our troops out if you don't...

LIASSON: No, we certainly can't. Look, money -- money, and also I just think the fact that we are responsible for them being in power at all. And I think they want to have a U.S.-backed government there.

The other thing that's happening is that right now, the sectarian violence is killing more people per week than insurgents, although it's pretty hard sometimes to tell them apart.

HUME: It is also hard to tell, you know, if somebody dies, it's a Shiite family, that's supposed to be sectarian, but you don't know who killed them.

LIASSON: Yes. But I think, though, that the U.S. feels a lot of urgency here, that the sooner a government is formed, perhaps the sooner it can put an end to the violence.

HUME: When we come back with our panel, we'll take a closer look at Senator John McCain, his race for the White House. Is he the straight talker he claimed to be? Is he moving right, and has he gotten there?

That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Neither party should be defined by pandering to the outer reaches of American politics and the agents of intolerance, whether they be Lewis Farrakhan or Al Sharpton on the left, or Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell on the right.

I believe that the, quote, "Christian right," has a major role to play in the Republican Party. One reason is because they are so active and their followers are and I believe they have a right to be a part of our party.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUME: Now John McCain then and John McCain now. John McCain will deliver a speech at Jerry Falwell's Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia in just a few weeks.

So something has changed. One presumes it's probably not Mr. Falwell. So what's going on here?

BARNES: You know, Brit, the thing is there's a pretty simple lesson that McCain learned in 2000 when he was running for president. And that is, if you're a maverick candidate, you don't win. So he's not a maverick candidate anymore.

When you just see the things he's doing. The Falwell thing is one of them, but he's warming up to all the Bush people. You know, he's hired Terry Nelson, who was the political director of the Bush campaign in 2004.

He has tried to hire Mark McKinnon, who was Bush's media guy in -- actually in all Bush's campaigns, in Texas and nationally. But he hasn't signed on yet. He's gone to see Jeb Bush. He took McKinnon with him. He went down to see Jeb Bush, the governor of Florida and he's going to be out in Texas sometime soon, if not today or tomorrow where George Bush 41, the first George Bush who was president is hosting him for a speech.

He's sending out money to all the state Republican committees. I mean, he is not -- no longer the outsider candidate. He's an insider candidate and I would say one thing, though, about Falwell. Falwell is sort of the past. He's a declining asset.

I mean, if you really want to attract the so-called Christian right, you want to do something with the Southern Baptist. You'd want to appear at the National Religious Broadcasters Conventions, which is here every year in Washington. You'd want to somehow hook up with James Dobson and Focus on the Family, who is a player in national politics.

HUME: In a way that Falwell is not.

BARNES: Well Falwell used to be, but isn't now.

SAMMON: I remember I went out and spent time with John McCain in 2000 on the so-called straight talk express and like all the reporters, I drank the Kool-Aid and I came out of there thinking, "Wow, this guy is giving me so much access and boy, it looks like he's going to be next president."

And I remember I came back to Washington and I talked to people in the Republican establishment and I was so struck by how much they distrust this guy. Whether it was campaign finance, whether it was taxes, whether it was his love of the media, his chasing of media headlines, which in itself was reason for conservatives to mistrust him.

And so clearly he is now moving to the right and hoping to avoid that problem that he encountered in 2000. I'm not sure it's going to wash or not. He still is on record as having opposed President Bush's tax cuts.

HUME: Although he has voted to extend them.

SAMMON: Well yes, but you can't unring the bell. The fact that when you cut the taxes, he wasn't there to help with it. I think that will be used against him in the campaign. And he still is the guy that was -- has his name on the McCain/Feingold so-called campaign reform legislation.

LIASSON: Look, if the Republican primary voters are going to base their decision on campaign finance reform, he's not going to get a lot of support. However, I'm going with John McCain to New Hampshire this weekend and I've been talking to a lot of Republicans, including some in South Carolina who didn't support him the first time, didn't really like him. He's been down there a lot and what I hear is his efforts at outreach are very sincere. And they're making some headway. He's got a lot of way to go.

HUME: I would think, Mara, took, that his efforts on behalf of the president in 2004 would not have gone unnoticed.

LIASSON: He has been the most eloquent defender of President Bush's policy in Iraq, sometimes more eloquent than the president himself. He has stood by him on the Dubai ports deal. In terms of inheriting the Bush mantle...

HUME: ... He's also with Bush on immigration, isn't he?

LIASSON: Oh, he's more than with Bush on immigration. He is actually a leader on that.

And I think that he is doing a balancing act. He is trying to make amends and, you know, time does heal some wounds. He is trying to bind up some old wounds that he had from the 2000 campaign. Don't forget this is 2000, not 2004.

He campaigned for Bush vociferously in 2004, very, very ably. And at the same time, he still -- he is for lobby reform and earmark reform. A lot of conservatives are for that. He certainly is one of the biggest anti-spenders out there. A lot of conservatives are for that.

So you have got to, you know, John McCain is like a smorgasbord and there is a lot there and some of it is not going to make the Republican base happy. But if you want a really electable candidate and he is supposed to have this incredible crossover appeal, he might offer Republicans a lot more than they thought he would.

SAMMON: One of the things that makes me think he is not going to be the guy...

HUME: ... It's a big buffet.

LIASSON: It's one of those foreign words that George Bush never uses.

BARNES: I've never heard of John McCain or any other politician called a smorgasbord, but it fits.

SAMMON: The fact that the mainstream media keeps saying John McCain is going to be the Republican nominee, to me...

HUME: ... They keep saying he's the front runner, but is he the front runner?

SAMMON: To me, is the first strike. And here's the other thing. I think as McCain tries to move right ward, he is going to find out that the further right he moves, the less of a media darling he is going to become. And I think that his biggest constituency has been the national press. And they will turn on him.

LIASSON: Wait a minute, this is a guy who won...

BARNES: ... He was the media darling in 2000, and what was the result of that?

LIASSON: He didn't win.

HUME: But he may have found that pleasing.

LIASSON: But there's somebody else who likes John McCain.

BARNES: Most people do, but when Bruce Babbitt, back when he was running sometime, he was the media darling. That does not help the people decide, let the press decide.

LIASSON: But you know who else? John McCain also was the Democrats favorite Republican, some of them. And now you see this -- a lot of attacks from the left. Oh, he is really conservative. Certainly you could have known that all along. But the more that he's attacked from the left, the more he is going to look appealing to the Republican primary base.

HUME: Well, he's somebody -- he's interesting. We'll come back to him often here.

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