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May 30, 2006

Special Report Roundtable - May 30

FOX News Special Report With Brit Hume

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. HARRY REID, (D) NV: The number one business for our casino operations are the fights, I served on the Nevada Athletic Commission and judged hundreds of fights. I would not be doing my job if I did not come to the fights. It's something that's important to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUME: Well, what fights? Two or three prize fights in Las Vegas that Harry Reid attended as the guest of the state athletic commission which regulates boxing and had some business pending before the Senate, business, it should be noted, in which Harry Reid was on the other side from the commission and the boxing tickets didn't convince him to change his mind. He believes as you heard him say he ought to be going to the fights because that's a big part of the business of the state. Indeed it is. What about this, Nina?

Excuse me. Excuse me. Let me introduce these people. First, Fred Barnes, executive editor of the "Weekly Standard." Mort Kondracke, executive editor of "Roll Call" and last but by far not least, Nina Easton, Washington bureau chief of "Fortune Magazine."

Go ahead.

NINA EASTON, "FORTUNE": It's good that you report earlier in the hour, pointed out he didn't change his vote on this. He's been very supportive of more federal regulation of boxing, which the Nevada commission has opposed. He's a very pugnacious guy. He thinks that because he didn't change his vote, it didn't affect him, because ethics rule actually say, a state agency -- it's OK to take this sort of thing from a state agency. But be forewarned if it has business before you, it's something you should think twice about. He probably should have taken the John McCain route, paid for them himself.

HUME: He says now that he would do it again.

EASTON: He says he would do it again. Particularly as the Senate and the Senate Democratic leader, appearances matter. But this doesn't rise to the level of William Jefferson or some of the Abramoff maters.

MORT KONDRACKE, "ROLL CALL": It's a modest I think indiscretion. If the three tickets were worth what John McCain paid for them. One ticket, it's what, $1,400 times three, whatever that is.

HUME: Forty-two hundred dollars.

KONDRACKE: That's not a big deal. He didn't change his vote or his position. Look, on the -- the question is, does this cut deeply into the Democratic argument of the culture of corruption against Republicans? It's a sliver, I think, off of it. So the Jefferson thing is much more problematical for the Democrats. The Mollohan thing is even more so.

HUME: What is that?

KONDRACKE: Alan Mollohan from West Virginia created this whole network of foundations, which -- through which he funneled federal grants of all kinds, earmarked. Then the people involved in the foundations were involved in business deals with him and he got rich through all these connections. And it stinks. And he was the Democratic ranking member of the House Ethics Committee which makes it even worse.

He was appointed by Nancy Pelosi. That's a web I think -- that plus Jefferson does cut into the culture of corruption.

HUME: Fred, what would you say tonight, Fred, is -- given these news stories and these events, is the sort of state of the culture of Republican corruption as a political issue?

FRED BARNES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": Well, I think absent of an indictment of Tom DeLay which of course is not going to happen. For his dealings with Abramoff. I think it's been -- it's an issue that's been completely nullified because of the Jefferson business, the Mollohan business.

HUME: Completely.

BARNES: The Reid business doesn't amount to much at all I have to say. The question is there are other cases like this come up, like the case of Terrance Boyle and his G.E. sock. He ruled against G.E. I don't believe .

HUME: He's the judicial candidate.

BARNES: And candidates are screaming about a conflict of interest. Let's see how Harry Reid comes out on that one. I mean these are -- the notion that somebody buys tickets or a meal or something, are somehow going to have their view changed on something, I think there is little chance of that. On the other hand the Associated Press has reported that Harry Reid received money from some Indian tribes and wrote letters on their behalf. These were clients of Jack Abramoff. Now that's more serious.

KONDRACKE: Now look, the Jack Abramoff scandal is fundamentally a Republican scandal. It has Democratic -- there are problems with -- like Harry Reid. But Abramoff himself is a Republican. Duke Cunningham, $2 million. Even Bill Jefferson hasn't collected that much. So the balance if you're going to weigh all these things I think is still .

BARNES: Is that the way you judge? The amount of money?

KONDRACKE: Well, yeah.

HUME: What is the campaign slogan? Vote for us, we're less corrupt than they are by a long shot?

EASTON: And Harry Reid voted against the Marianas Island initiative on the part of Abramoff. So he didn't even carry Abramoff's water.

KONDRACKE: Look, the average voter .

BARNES: He wrote these letters. According to the Associated Press on behalf of Abramoff's clients. Now, look, that may amount to nothing, either. But it's the kind of thing that Democrats have cited when building up this notion of a culture of corruption that Mort seems to take very seriously.

KONDRACKE: And look, top aides of Tom DeLay, this holier than thou person to be indicted - oh come on please, he is Mr. Morality, Mr. Family values. And he has this nest of thieves that are apparently working for him, some have pleaded guilty already. The stench is more from the Republican side than from the Democratic side.

EASTON: And we wonder why congressional approval ratings are so low.

HUME: I like this. Vote for us. We smell bad. But a little better. Might even work.

BARNES: They take bigger bribes.

HUME: When we come back with our panel, the president picks Hank Paulson to head the Treasury Department. We'll talk about that next. His friends call him Henry. We call him Hank.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HENRY PAULSON, TREASURY SECRETARY NOMINEE: Our economy's strength is rooted in the entrepreneurial spirit and the competitive zeal of the American people. And in our free and open market. It is truly a marvel, but we cannot take it for granted. We must take steps to maintain our competitive edge in the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUME: So the fabled investment house Goldman Sachs has brought us yet another treasury secretary. Previously it brought us Robert Ruben, who was President Clinton's treasury secretary for a number of years and a man much admired in Washington then and now. It also gave us Senator Jon Corzine, now Governor Jon Corzine of New Jersey and now Henry Paulson nominated by president bush to be the new treasury secretary succeeding John Snow.

Just to give you an example of how well-regarded he is in both parties, Senator Schumer was out today quickly with a statement in which he said basically -- there you see it - "I spoke with Hank Paulson this morning, pledged my full support for his nomination. His experience, intelligence and deep understanding of national and global issues make him the best pick America could have hoped for."

So I think it's reasonable to suggest, panel that confirmation is probably not, if that's a valid sample, not an issue here. So what does the president get out of this? Was it -- and did Snow as conventional wisdom holds really do a poor job of getting out the news that the economy is in good shape? Nina?

EASTON: Well, the Schumer quote was interesting, because Paulson actually gave Schumer a donation, a campaign donation back when he was in the house. So he's got some ties to Democrats, mostly he's been a Bush fundraiser. He's not a shrinking violet. He's known for being stealthy and steely.

BARNES: Stealthy?

EASTON: Yes. He doesn't have a high media profile. My colleague at "Fortune" .

HUME: He's not a shirking violet but he has a low media profile?

EASTON: Well, he's an internal .

HUME: He's tough inside.

EASTON: that's the point I was going to get it to, Brit. To what extent he will be a good spokesperson for the economy, because he's not a high profile guy. He is known as I said, he's tough. He's a conservationist, an environmentalist who has a liking for animals of prey as he puts it. He likes snakes as he revealed in a rare interview with my "Fortune" colleague.

But I do think it does raise that question -- Bush right now, the big concern of this administration is that there is all this good news about the economy, it's not getting out, whether right or wrong, they don't believe Snow did a good job. And will he?

KONDRACKE: The White House regards this as a grand coup, that this guy is a superstar, that he's known to all the world's finance ministers and central bankers, that Goldman Sachs is the biggest American investment banking house. And here .

HUME: It's the most prestigious.

KONDRACKE: And here in the second term, unlike Bob Ruben who was there at the beginning and in the first term of the Clinton administration when it was everybody was gravitating to Washington, he is coming in the second term, which they think adds luster to the appointment.

I think Snow did what he was assigned to do. He sold like crazy. He was out there making speeches all the time. I don't know that anybody ever listened to him.

It seems like the problem of Bush getting through on the economy to the public, if that's what he's supposed to do, has more to do with Iraq than it has to do with the state of the economy.

HUME: Because of the drowning out by the bad news factor.

KONDRACKE: The public seems - well, partly it is high gas prices and partly it is high healthcare - increased partly and partly it is stagnant take home wages and that kind of thing.

I don't know how a new treasury secretary can convince the average lunch bucket worker that his economic condition has improved. If snow couldn't do it I don't know how Paulson does.

I think Paulson's benefit is in the financial markets.

BARNES: It does benefit there and of course take home pay and personal income have improved, just not as much as the overall economy and partly because healthcare costs have gone up.

This shows I think the breadth of the authority at hiring new people of the new White House chief of staff. Josh Bolten. He -- remember Josh Bolten used to work at Goldman Sachs back in the `90s, and so Paulson was his boss at one point. He worked on it for month after month after month when Paulson was saying no, and finally the Saturday before last he came out of the white house and accepted the job when Bush offered it to him. I think it's a real coup. If you are the head of Goldman Sachs, you're the number one guy on Wall Street and everybody knows it.

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