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April 06, 2008

Panel Discusses the Democratic Race

Fox News Sunday

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: Now, don't get me wrong. I have absolutely nothing against rich people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: That was Hillary Clinton after her campaign put out tax returns showing she and her husband have made more than $100 million since leaving the White House.

And it's time now for our Sunday group, Fox News contributors Fred Barnes of The Weekly Standard, Mara Liasson of National Public Radio, Bill Kristol, also of The Weekly Standard, and Juan Williams, also from National Public Radio.

We are truly fair and balanced today, everyone. All right.

So let's take a look at the numbers from the Clinton tax returns. Let's put them up on the screen. The Clintons made $109 million in the last eight years, they paid $33.8 million in taxes, and they gave $10.2 million in charitable contributions.

Fred, does that put the Clinton money issue to rest?

BARNES: Well, no, I don't think so at all. I mean, now, look. They're doing something to greater excess that has become quite common in Washington, and that's cashing in on your public service. You know, there's a word for it, "buckraking," and a lot of people do it.

Congressional aides go and become lobbyists, and some senators like Trent Lott become super lobbyists -- and John Breaux of Louisiana as well. And some people become stars and get huge amounts of money giving speeches, like Colin Powell.

WALLACE: And is there anything wrong with it?

BARNES: No. Well, there's nothing wrong with it, but I don't think -- and it's not shocking to all of us in Washington.

But I think it will be shocking to the American public when they see these incredible numbers and this amount of money that the Clintons have made. And I'll have to say it is so different than the way it used to be some years ago.

I mean, Harry Truman went back to Missouri and wrote his memoirs, I guess. That was about it. Eisenhower went to Gettysburg. Now you hit the lecture circuit, and the Clintons have made zillions.

WALLACE: Mara, let's pick up on some things that the Clinton tax returns don't tell us. And let's put those up. President Clinton made between $12 million and $15 million from Yucaipa Companies, an investment firm that does business with, among others, Dubai and the Chinese. We don't know what the president's role was there.

And we still don't know who gave millions of dollars to fund his presidential library. Do you think that part of it, what we don't know, is an issue?

LIASSON: Yes. Well, I think it's a -- I think what we don't know is the area where the most interesting facts might eventually come out if anybody could get at them.

I mean, what we don't know is -- and I don't think there's any question -- nobody's accusing them of this, but did he invest $1 in Yucaipa and get $15 million? Was it kind of like cattle futures? Or exactly, you know, the connection between the people he's helped, you know, in foreign business deals versus big contributions to the library.

There's a lot of confluence between people he's given speeches to and donations to Hillary's campaign. No accusations of anything shady or illegal, but we just don't know a lot of facts.

WALLACE: Bill, do you think the Clintons can now hold the line and say, "We've done this dump, we have basically given you, between being governor, running for president, now this, 30 years worth of financial returns, that's it?"

KRISTOL: Well, I don't know. I think the Yucaipa, which is Ron Burkle's firm, seems to have just paid Bill Clinton a salary of $3 million a year, on average, to open doors. Maybe he was worth that.

But I think -- let me get back to Fred's point. As Fred said, there's nothing shocking anymore about cashing in on public service.

People understand it to be a kind of making up for the rather moderate salaries people took when they were senators or governors or cabinet secretaries.

But usually you do that at the end -- after your public life has ended. You don't cash in on public service and then run for office. Now, to be fair, Hillary...

WALLACE: Well, he's not running for office. KRISTOL: No, that's exactly my second point. To be fair to Hillary Clinton, she didn't. I mean, she was first lady. Then she became senator from New York.

And therefore, it brings Bill Clinton back into the center of the picture. I think that's the implication of the tax returns.

Somehow, everyone is reminded once again that if you get Hillary Clinton, you get Bill, too. You get the possible conflicts of interest. You get the cashing in on public service in a somewhat unseemly way.

And I think it's just another nail, frankly, in Hillary Clinton's political coffin in this nomination contest.

WALLACE: Don't, you know, sugar-coat it here, Bill.

KRISTOL: Well, I don't mean to be harsh. I say that, of course, with sorrow, not with...

WILLIAMS: I don't know why you would say it's a nail in some coffin. I just think people will think that they made a lot, a lot of money. And as Fred said, this is what goes on in Washington. It goes on all the time.

I think President Reagan went over to Asia and made speeches for zillions of dollars. Nobody says, "Oh, that's terrible."

BARNES: Yes, $1 million it was.

WILLIAMS: OK. So $1 million.

WALLACE: For two speeches.

WILLIAMS: Right. Yes. OK.

BARNES: He was well paid, but...

WILLIAMS: So my point...

KRISTOL: And Nancy Reagan didn't run for office.

WILLIAMS: Well, all I'm -- it's just a different life, a different time. All I'm saying is why would you say that? I don't know.

It seems to me that, you know, if we want to look at John McCain, we can start asking questions about his wife, the heiress to a beer fortune. Where's all that money coming from which John McCain's...

WALLACE: It's coming from people drinking beer.

WILLIAMS: well, no, but I'm saying -- you know what? Giving speeches, drinking beer, which -- I prefer giving the speeches as a source of income, if that's what you want to get into. I don't see that this is an issue at all. It will create the image that these are extremely rich people, and that they are. And if that's to be held against her, then I could say it's a negative.

But she could also lend money to her campaign. I think the campaign could use money after the results this week that indicated Barack Obama again has doubled what she...

WALLACE: $40 million versus $20 million.

WILLIAMS: Correct, and put ads up in Pennsylvania that have contributed to what he's...

WALLACE: Let me get to Pennsylvania. A little over two weeks until the Pennsylvania primary. Let's put some poll numbers up. The most recent RealClearPolitics average of recent polls shows Clinton now with a seven- point lead. Only a week or so ago it was double digits.

What's your sense of Pennsylvania, Mara?

LIASSON: Well, clearly, it's tightened. I mean, we've seen this before in state after state where she had something like a 20-point lead. He manages to shrink it but can't seem to get over those last five points to win. I mean, that happened in Texas and Ohio.

I think that the polls have definitely tightened. He's been campaigning there in a different way. Instead of the big rallies where he's like a rock star, he's actually been holding smaller meetings, trying to relate to, you know, white working-class people.

He's been able to outspend her on television I think 4-1 there. I mean, the money does matter. I don't know if it means that he's going to win Pennsylvania.

I think the big question about Pennsylvania is will she get double digits or will he hold her to a kind of single digits, less than Ohio- type...

WALLACE: Let me ask you about that, Fred, because...

LIASSON: And that makes a huge difference for her, because she can't catch up to him in the popular vote, which I think now is agreed upon as a criteria for her to be able to make her case to the superdelegates, if she doesn't win Pennsylvania by double digits.

WALLACE: Let me ask you, Fred -- I mean, this gets into one of these classic "better than expected," "less than expected."

BARNES: Yes.

WALLACE: Is a win a win, or does she have to win by a certain margin for that to keep her alive and viable in the Democratic race?

BARNES: I think she has to win.

WALLACE: Well, she clearly has to win.

BARNES: Yes, and that's enough. But look. Mara's right, and I think Democrats have come to agree. She's 740,000 votes behind in the popular vote. She's got to be ahead or she doesn't have an argument when you come to the end of these 10 primaries.

It just makes it harder to pick up -- if she doesn't pick up a couple hundred thousand votes in Pennsylvania, she's going to have to pick them up somewhere else, and it's hard to imagine where -- maybe in Puerto Rico.

But look. If she comes to the end of the road here, she's going to be behind in delegates and behind in popular vote, she has no argument that she can give the superdelegates. If they went with her then, it would split the party.

WALLACE: All right. We need to step aside for a moment.

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