Special Report Roundtable - October 16

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WANG GUANGYA, CHINESE AMBASSADOR TO U.N.: The question is whether China would do inspections. Yes. But inspection is different than interception and interdiction. I think in that area, different countries would do it in different ways. But that is a Security Council resolution; I mean that chapter seven and article 41, therefore, the resolution has to be implemented.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUME: Well, that's not exactly a ringing assertion of China's new aggressive approach towards North Korea but it's a lot better than some people thought China would ever do and in fact, as noted earlier in this program, China is continuing to build a fence along its border with North Korea and it also did inspect some cargo shipments headed in there, which is better, I suppose, than nothing.

So what about this situation with the U.N. Resolution calling for sanctions? Is this the strong measure the administration had promised or what? Some thoughts from Fred Barnes, executive editor of the "Weekly Standard"; Mort Kondracke, executive editor of "Roll Call"; and Mara Liasson, national political correspondent or National Public Radio -- FOX NEWS contributors, all.

What do we have here, Mara, we have a weak resolution, strong resolution -- what?

MARA LIASSON, NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO: I think it was weaker than the U.S. originally wanted, but it was better nothing. And I think the initial reports were that China would vote for this thing and then do absolutely nothing and it looks like they're doing something. And as you just hear the ambassador said, he makes a distinction between inspection and intervention and interdiction, he doesn't -- it doesn't sound like China's going to be boarding any ships soon -- North Korea but they are inspecting trucks coming over the border and I think that's clearly a first step.

I mean, over and over again this administration has said the ball in China's court and China is the most important country when it comes to enforcing any kind of sanctions. So it sounds like they're actually doing something, a little something.

MORT KONDRACKE, "ROLL CALL": Yeah, well, the Chinese apparently want flexibility. They did not want the U.N. Resolution itself to compel every nation to inspect North Korean cargoes going in and out. But on their own, they're going to do what they choose to do. Now, how much they're going to do, who knows? Right now they're inspecting some trucks, they say that they're not going to interdict. I mean, what happens if they catch a nuclear, you know, material going in or out? Are they going to stop it? I assume so, but who knows? I would guess so. I mean.

HUME: He didn't say they wouldn't, he said inspection for sure and these other things, well, he sounded like it was kind of case by case.

KONDRACKE: Well, and it sounds as though they want to be flexible and turn the spigot on or off depending on what their relations with North Korea are and they want -- this looks like its a warning to North Korea, that, you know, we are going to -- we're mad at you for humiliating us and we're going to start inspecting just the way the world wants us to, but you know maybe we won't some other time if you're on good behavior. And I think that building the fence is a security device against the possibility of a collapse where they, you know, it would stop millions of people from teeming across the border.

FRED BARNES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": You're for it there, just not here. Is that right?

KONDRACKE: Yeah. No, actually, I'm against it there, too.

BARNES: Oh, OK. The -- I don't know what the Chinese are doing. Look, they have -- the Chinese have the power to completely shut North Korea down because that's where North Korea gets most of its food and energy and they don't seem to want to do that. Look, I know, you know, Kim Jong-il is a hard guy to deal with, but you know, they can handle him just like that. I wish they would. But they don't want to because they're worrying about other things, you know, the Koreans.

HUME: Well, will this sanctions regime succeed or fail?

BARNES: It'll fail -- utterly. Look, this is a guy, Brit, who let a couple million of his people die of starvation so he could fund his military program. He's a guy -- now, how do they get their hard currency in North Korea? They get it from selling weapons illegally, selling drugs or counterfeiting American dollars.

KONDRACKE: Yeah, I -- look, I think that in terms of stopping the nuclear program, not going to work. In terms, the only hope we have, I think, is to prevent nuclear materials from leaving the country. I mean, the -- and if the North Korea -- I mean if the Chinese are serious about that, then we can get somewhere and if we got good intelligence -- big if - - we've inspected North Korean shipping before and cargoes from other countries before, under the Proliferation Security Initiative, and if we have intelligence that they're about to smuggle something out to a terrorist group, maybe we can catch them -- maybe.

LIASSON: I think it would be pretty difficult. I think North Korea will be a nuclear power. They probably are already.

HUME: And have been.

LIASSON: And have been for quite some time. I think we're going to have to live with a North Korea that has nuclear weapons and I think the big question is should they give some of this material to a terrorist group? I don't think we're going to know until after the fact.

HUME: When we come back with the panel, Republicans may be down in the polls but President Bush and White House insiders remain upbeat. We'll tell you about that -- or talk about that in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL O'REILLY, O'REILLY FACTOR: If the Republicans lose control of the House and Senate in a few weeks, in the election, is that going to influence you?

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't buy in to that premise, for starters. It's kind of a trick question because the minute I start answering your question, then the word is well, Bush anticipates losing. I don't anticipate losing. I anticipate a tough fight.

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HUME: And in the White House the word is that the political advisers from Karl Rove on down say, look, it's a tough environment but we're pull this out. Back with our panel. How about it? Is the scenario -- first of all you may help describe it by which the Republicans recover from being behind and what Carl Cameron describes is like 26 Republican held seats where there -- it's either a tossup or they're trailing and they only need to loose about half of those and the Democrats get control. Do they have a plausible scenario -- Mara.

LIASSON: Well, I think this scenario is based on having the kind of tried-and-true Republican closing game -- and they are good closures -- work again. Which is that they're going to use their financial advantage and their going to use their superior Get Out the Vote operation to eke out a victory, which would mean losing seats fewer than 15. I think that's going to be tough.

HUME: In the House.

LIASSON: In the house. Now in the Senate, I don't think anyone is predicting now that they are going to lose control of the Senate. They are going to lose seats, I don't think they'll lose control there. But, this is very tough. You know, I talked about the NPR poll, it's coming out tomorrow morning and it show that in those 48 swing districts, the most competitive districts, the generic ballot shows the Democrats are up 11. Now, that's a bad place for Republicans to be even in those competitive districts, 38 of them are held by Republicans.

KONDRACKE: What I gather is that they think that the Foley scandal has run its course and that now they can get back to the message, which is the economy is good and the Democrats are weak on national security. Most every Republican and Democrat, for that matter, consultant or pollster that I've talked to think that the Democrats are going to win at least 15 and a lot of Republicans think it will be in the 30 range, because they just think the bottom is dropping out.

Now, there's obviously still time to recover, but I still -- I've always thought that Iraq is the main determinant of the national mood, the news keeps getting worse and worse, and the, you know, new factor is this James Baker report that's coming after the election. I can -- the idea that we're going to have a major shift in policy recommended by one of the Bush family's closest aides and advisers after the election, different from what we have now, I don't think helps the president or the Republican cause at all.

HUME: Do you think it's true?

KONDRACKE: It sounds like it's true based on the build up to it.

BARNES: I don't think we'll have a change no matter what Jim Baker says.

KONDRACKE: Well, it doesn't mean that we're going to have a change, we're going to have a change recommended by Baker.

BARNES: Look, I agree with everything you said until you got to Jim Baker, he's not affecting this. Whatever he does after the election isn't going to.

KONDRACKE: I don't think it builds confidence in president's campaign in Iraq.

BARNES: Bush needs one thing -- I think they're going to lose the House. But there's a way they could not lose the House and that is -- every election has a tilt at the end. There's a trend at the end, as Mara said, Republicans in the past have been good closes, they were in 2002, were in 2004. If Bush can build up some steam and Republicans can, they could get the -- a tilt if their direction at the end and a lot of close races would go their way and they'd wind up losing fewer than 15 House seats.

And that I think is what -- I mean, look, Karl Rove and others at the White House and Ken Mehlman have pulled that of before in 2002 and 2004 and they think they can do it again. It's going to be a heck of a lot harder in 2006, but you know, they have a scenario that I think's credible, I just -- I'm just very dubious.

HUME: Now, the question is whether the Republicans are in the same position the Democrats were in `94. On one count, anyway, it might be worth asking the question, is -- which -- who is better prepared to face the possibility of major losses?

BARNES: Oh, the Republicans.

The Democrats in '94 or the Republicans in '06?

KONDRACKE: The Democrats -- yeah.

BARNES: The Republicans are because they've seen this thing coming and Democrats were stupidly surprised.

LIASSON: They had less notice. This has been going on for a year. But which is interesting is that Republicans have had so much time to do everything an embattled incumbent needs to do and they're still facing the situation three weeks out.

HUME: Well, they always postpone their best for last, though.

LIASSON: Yeah, but the thing is that the -- other thing that's interesting is the president's efforts to reframe the debate around terrorism instead of Iraq have not worked.

HUME: Yeah, they worked for about a month.

LIASSON: And then.

BARNES: Yeah, that was September, not October.

LIASSON: Yeah, peaked too early, right.

KONDRACKE: (INAUDIBLE) oh, by the way, there was a.

HUME: Quickly.

KONDRACKE: "New York Times" story that the Republicans are pulling out of Pennsylvania and.

HUME: It's not true.

KONDRACKE: It's not true?