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August 31, 2006

Special Report Roundtable - August 31

FOX News Special Report With Brit Hume

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Some politicians look at our efforts in Iraq and see a diversion from the War on Terror. That would come as news to Osama bin Laden who proclaimed that the third world war is raging in Iraq.

It comes as news to No. 2 man of al Qaeda, Zawahiri, who has called the struggle in Iraq "the place in the greatest battle." It's hard to believe that these terrorists would make long journeys across dangerous borders, endure heavy fighting or blow themselves up in the streets of Baghdad for a so-called diversion.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUME: That was President Bush today trying to convince -- either make or maintain the link between the war in Iraq and War on Terror, something that polls show the American public does not agree with. Indeed Dick Morris, the political strategist who helped President Clinton get reelected by a strategy of triangulation, as he called it, is urging a similar strategy for the president in dealing with this issue of Iraq and the War on Terror.

Morris wrote this week, in fact, "It's time for triangulation. Bush and the Republicans need to stop alienating voters by arguing that Iraq is an indispensable front in the War on Terror. They should center," as he goes on to say, "their fall campaign to keep control of Congress on the national security issues sans Iraq."

Now what about this? Some thoughts from Fred Barnes, executive editor of the "Weekly Standard"; Mort Kondracke, executive editor of "Roll Call"; and Nina Easton, Washington bureau chief of "Fortune" magazine. All are FOX NEWS contributors.

Nina, what do you think of Dick Morris' idea and what do you think about the president's rhetorical campaign now underway today?

NINA EASTON, "FORTUNE": Well, I think Dick Morris is -- I think it's crazy to say that you should ignore Iraq. Candidates ignore Iraq at their own peril. This is the issue that's driving this campaign, that's driving Democratic chances, that drove Ned Lamont's campaign. You have -- people are angry and upset about this war and you have to address it and I don't you can -- it's elephant in the room. You can't get away without talking about it.

HUME: Well, what about the idea, though, that when you discuss the War on Terror and the threat facing the nation and your opponents alleged weakness on that that you don't talk about Iraq in that context?

EASTON: Well, that's the second piece I was going to say. I do think that there is -- I do think to some extent the president buries the lead, as it were, in our journalistic lingo, in that he -- it's a front on the War on Terror. I think the most compelling case to be made is what happens if you pull out? What happens if you pick up your troops and go home? Then it's definitely -- it's going to become, it's going to be, you know, chaotic, it's going to be a terrorist threat to this country and I think that's a very compelling case to be made. This overarching, you know, with the soaring rhetoric and the -- this is a front on the War on Terror, I'm just not sure how well that connects with the swing voters that he's trying to appeal to for November.

MORT KONDRACKE, "ROLL CALL": No, he did make that case. He said this was a stake speech. If we lose in Iraq it would be a disaster. We pull out of Iraq prematurely you it will be a disaster. The terrorists will take over, they'll chase us to over here. They're not going to stop in Iraq, et cetera, et cetera.

He also said, think what a victory would do. That it would transform the situation all over the Middle East. This was a fine speech. It's another fine speech on Bush's part. That's the problem. I mean, it's a lot like the speech that he gave at the National Endowment for Democracy in 2005. As I said before, I mean, what's going to transform the situation is actual results on the ground.

I would also say one other thing, I mean, this was a high-minded speech -- it was a policy speech, it was not a political speech. He said his opponents are sincere, patriotic people, they are just dead wrong. And that seems to be that that's an effective way to fight them instead of calling them appeasers. You know, I don't think that that people who want to pull out of Iraq are appeasers, or that they think that somehow we're going to get along with Osama bin Laden if we pull out of Iraq. I don't think that that's their motive. They just think it's wrong. And I think that the Democrats are wrong on this point. I think the Democrats are wrong on a lot of points, but calling them names I don't think is going to work.

FRED BARNES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": No, maybe it won't. I thought this was a good speech too, and he did make the point, you know, he quoted the General John Abizaid as saying if we leave they will follow us, and Bush said he's right.

The -- look on Dick Morris -- Dick Morris' view is, he's a political consultant, if it doesn't poll well drop it. The truth is that Bush is linking Iraq to the War on Terror; I don't think that's alienating voters. They may disagree with it.

HUME: Well, that's what the polls suggest.

BARNES: Well so what. They don't disagree -- I mean they disagree with a lot of things. Remember, go back to the `70s, was -- in 1972 was the Vietnam war unpopular? Were people fed up, were they angry, where they -- want to get all the American troops out as soon as possible? Of course they were. And then they overwhelmingly voted against the guy who was advocating that, George McGovern.

The thing that I -- one of the things I think hurts Democrats is when they keep talking about deploying troops. I mean anybody with eyeballs can see through that. When you redeploy troops, can see that what they're talking -- they won't admit what they're really doing and that's withdrawing, pulling troops out -- or as John Murtha says, immediately out of Iraq. I think when you're playing around with language like that people see through it. Bush -- look, he's stuck with Iraq. He has to stick with it, he has to talk about it, and he has to talk, as Nina said he has to talk about what would happen if those who want to redeploy the troops, if their advice is taken and I thought he did very well in this speech.

HUME: When we come back with the panel, now the United Nations deadline has passed, today. What's next for Iran and the rest of the world? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOLTON: Let's be clear what the bottom line conclusion here is today. Iran is defying the international community, Iran is not suspending its uranium enrichment activity and from all we can see in this report, it continues to pursue a nuclear weapons capability in violation of its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUME: The report, of which John Bolton was speaking there, is the report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is the U.N.'s watchdog agency for the enforcement of various U.N. resolutions and international treaties regarding nuclear weapons. Iran, it has said today, is in effect, obviously in noncompliance and obviously ignoring this U.N. deadline. So, where does this seem likely to go from here? This is -- obviously this was not unexpected -- Nina.

EASTON: Not unexpected. I mean, this report shows that there's reason to suspect that the country, the regime is pursuing nuclear weapons capability at the very least. Where does it go from here? You need sanctions; you need sanctions that hurt to. And I think to get that you need Russia. Russia which sells military and nuclear supplies to Iran and it may be a moment where the president needs to go meet with Putin and say, you know, how do we get this? Because otherwise you develop this, what we've called the coalition of the willing to just impose sanctions. That's not a Security Council sanction on Iran and that's not going to have teeth.

HUME: Well, wait a minute, but if the nations that are willing, any of them have any significant relationship with Iran, that could be effective could it not?

EASTON: It could be effective, but I mean, from what I understand from people I've spoken to, you really need Russia onboard.

KONDRACKE: Well, and one suggestion which I first actually heard from Fred was that what Bush would say to Putin and the Chinese, look our relationship now depends on this. This is a menace to the world and this takes precedence over everything else that we got going on and so we expect you, you said that you would be for sanctions if they didn't comply with the deadline, now is the time to deliver or else. And there's got to be -- there would have to be consequences.

HUME: What would the consequence against Russia and/or Iran be?

KONDRACKE: Well, I mean, you could -- you would put a chill in the air in all kind of ways: Trade ways, finance ways. I mean you'd have to - - I'm not exactly clear on what, you know, what you would do to the -- the very act of saying our relationship depends upon this and is in itself a major statement. But beyond that I disagree with -- if that doesn't work, I disagree with Nina. I think there's a lot that the Europeans and we can do together to freeze assets.

HUME: U.N. Security Council resolution or no, right?

KONDRACKE: Yeah, I mean, the U.N. Security Council has spoken. The Iranians have defied it, they've more than defied it, they're even going to start building a heavy water reactor which will produce plutonium, another way of producing a nuclear weapon. So -- but there's a lot of things you can do and as we've discussed before, you know, Mark Kirk, the head of the -- the chairman of the Iran study group in the House of Representatives who studied this a lot, has this proposal for cutting off the gasoline, if that's going to...

HUME: They don't have much refinery capacity.

KONDRACKE: Right, and there's a Dutch company that is responsible for the hiring the ships that deliver the gasoline, there's Lloyds of London that could cut off the insurance and that would just dry up the supply.

BARNES: You know, what Mort was talking about, what you would say to Putin and the president of China, both of whom personally assured President Bush that they were with him on sanctions at the Saint Petersburg Group of Eight Meeting -- there was a group of seven, whatever it is, group of seven plus Russia, the -- but -- and he would have to, just by saying, as Mort suggested, we are reassessing our relationship with you, Russia and you China and I don't think anybody has thought through exactly what steps you would take but it would be very meaningful.

You know, even without the U.N., if you had Germany, France, India, and Italy, and India would be hard to get, if they cut off economic relations suddenly with Iran it would hurt. On the other hand, as Nina was suggesting, the stuff that Russia does while it may not you know, dominate the Iranian economy, but it's built nuclear reactors and sell them all kinds of other weapons that's significant, too. You'd certainly want to have that cut off.

HUME: So, on this whole question of sanctions, nobody at this table believes it's mission impossible, that you could never get effective sanctions? You think there area effective sanctions?

BARNES: I think you could get them.

HUME: Mort do you think so.

KONDRACKE: Sure, there are, I do.

HUME: Nina.

BARNES: I'm not saying you will, but you could.

NINA: But you couldn't -- the other question on Russia.

HUME: Quickly.

NINA: .is there a way to make the country whole, if for the business it would lose on all of this. And I don't think China or Russia has an interest in having a nuclear armed Iran in the Middle East.

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