MR. RUSSERT: Kate O’Beirne, many observers believe that the Republicans like to have the issue of pro-life, but with a Republican president and a Republican-controlled Congress, they won’t try to pass a constitutional amendment to ban abortion. They don’t want to overturn Roe v. Wade because they’re afraid of the political fallout.

MS. O’BEIRNE: Tim, I think the Republican Party has clearly benefited by being broadly the pro-life party. The Democrats have paid a very heavy price for supporting this unrestricted right to an abortion. Look, 25 years ago, there were 292 members and a Democratic majority in the House. A hundred and twenty-five of them were pro-life Democrats. On the other hand, when it comes to the abortion issue, far too many Republicans, sort of the opposite of what’s generally the case, walked the walk but won’t talk the talk. And part of that is the intimidation, frankly, of the women’s movement, as I said, by hyping the phony gender gap. It was first talked about in 1984, for instance, with Ronald Reagan. He was pro-life. He opposed the ERA. Geraldine Ferraro was making history on the other ticket and Ronald Reagan carried 56 percent of women voters. There’s no monolithic women’s vote. There are no monolithic women’s issues, but the intimidation of the women’s movement has convinced far too many politicians that that is the case.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you think the Republicans want to overturn Roe v. Wade?

MS. O’BEIRNE: I think they would be unsettled by it as with the public initially—of course, the public misunderstands and thinks Roe v. Wade only commits abortion in the first three months, but should it be overturned and go back to the Democratic process and let the 50 states divide their policies, I do think at the national level the issue would stop helping Republicans as it has in recent years.

MR. RUSSERT: You just heard Senator Schumer, Kate Michelman, say that even if Judge Alito will not answer questions about Roe v. Wade, that in itself is not grounds for filibuster.

MS. MICHELMAN: Well, I would say that, you know, what we have to remember about Samuel Alito is that he—and I have to say that, you know, I’ve been involved in many Supreme Court nomination battles, and for me, personally, this is the most important and it’s the most important because it’s the first time that one justice could take away the right of women to make the most intimate decision of their lives and give that...

MR. RUSSERT: So unless he pledges to uphold Roe v. Wade, he should be filibustered.

MS. MICHELMAN: Well, I don’t think Roe v. Wade and whether Roe v. Wade is going to be overturned is really the issue. That’s a parlor game inside of Washington. What is at issue is the individual right to privacy and dignity for American women and the issue of who’s going to get to decide the most intimate aspects of our lives. Judge Alito replaces Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a justice who was the critical and decisive fifth vote that protected women’s legal rights, including their right to reproductive choice, and Judge Alito’s record indicates very clearly that he approaches the law very different from Justice O’Connor, that he will swing the court dangerously and differently against women’s rights and not just our right to reproductive freedom but, you know, our rights to affirmative action.

Story continues below ↓

MR. RUSSERT: But you have said if a judicial candidate has those views he should be filibustered.

MS. MICHELMAN: He should be—he should be—should not be confirmed. If it takes a filibuster, it takes a filibuster. But this is a dangerous moment for the court, and I think a Judge Alito confirmation will consolidate the Scalia-Thomas philosophy on the court, and that is not a good thing for the future of women.

MR. RUSSERT: I’ll give you 30 seconds on Alito.

MS. O’BEIRNE: Well, I don’t think it’s peculiar to Sam Alito. Let’s not forget that Kate Michelman and her allies were arguing that David Souter, should he be put on the court, the tag line in that campaign was “Women will die.” Any Republican president’s nominee is going to meet up with this kind of opposition and get confirmed, nonetheless, because a majority of the public and women don’t support this unrestricted right Kate does.

MR. RUSSERT: To be continued. The two Kates: Kate O’Beirne, “Women Who Make the World Worse”; Kate Michelman, “With Liberty and Justice for All.” Thank you very much.

MS. O’BEIRNE: Thanks, Tim.

MS. MICHELMAN: Thank you, Tim.

MR. RUSSERT: Next up, James Risen, author of “State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration.” He’s next right here on MEET THE PRESS.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: And we are back.

James Risen, welcome.

MR. JAMES RISEN: Thank you.

MR. RUSSERT: In The New York Times and in this book, you broke the story about the National Security Agency eavesdropping on phone calls of American citizens with al-Qaeda operatives, the president would say, without a court warrant. How did you find out about that story?

MR. RISEN: Well, people in the government who had been told about it or were involved in it came to me because they were deeply troubled. They felt that there was something going wrong in the government. They believed that there was illegal activity. And my colleague, Eric Lichtblau, at The New York Times also began to hear the same thing from other people. And we happened to sit next to each other in the Washington Bureau of The New York Times and we began to compare notes, and we realized we were hearing about the same thing.

MR. RUSSERT: The president said that we’re in a state of war, that this was an important program to find out what the enemy was up to, and it was a shameful act for people to leak that information to you.

MR. RISEN: Well, I disagree with the president, respectfully. I think that they are patriots. I think that these people who came forward did so in the best tradition of whistle-blowing and they did so for the best reasons, and that is because they believed that there was illegal activity going on. Whether the—it was illegal or not is something that will now have to be determined.

MR. RUSSERT: Did you guarantee your sources that you would never identify them, even if it meant going to prison?

MR. RISEN: Well, I don’t want to get into my conversations with my sources, but I—you know, I—they are anonymous sources, and I don’t want to get into anything beyond that what—depending on what the status of the leak investigation becomes, because...

MR. RUSSERT: But rather than identify your sources, would you be willing to go to prison?

MR. RISEN: Well, if I have to I will. But I hope that that never happens.

MR. RUSSERT: Amid much speculation as to why the The New York Times held this story, you had written it, you had finished it, you knew it was—what reflected what your reporting had shown. It may have played a role in the election of 2004 if it had been published in October. Why was it held?

MR. RISEN: Well, I—you know, I can’t get into all the details of what happened at The New York Times. I think I’d rather focus on the fact that it’s been a great public service by The Times that we published this story, and that, you know, this was something that has been now made public in a way that we can have a national debate. And I think I’d rather focus on the fact that The Times has, as I said, performed a public service. And we did scoop everybody else. Everybody forgets that we had it first.

MR. RUSSERT: But it was a national security decision or a political decision which caused The Times to hold the story?

MR. RISEN: Well, you know, as the president has said, you know, they have argued that this was a breach of national security to reveal this. I would argue that this was something that the public had to know.

MR. RUSSERT: Another story that was not published by The Times that has created an uproar in the intelligence community was Operation MERLIN, which you talk about it in your book. And let me show it on the screen. “Operation MERLIN has been one of the most closely guarded secrets in the Clinton and Bush administrations. And it may not be over. Some officials have suggested it might be repeated against other countries. ... It’s not clear who originally came up with the idea, but the plan was first approved by President Bill Clinton. After the Russian scientist’s fateful trip to Vienna, however, the MERLIN operation was endorsed by the Bush administration, possibly with an eye toward repeating it against North Korea or other dangerous states.”

An operation where an agent would present fake blueprints to “help” Iran or another country build a nuclear bomb, but because it was fake, it would, in effect, delay their operation. The CIA has issued a very sharp comment about you, and let me read it. “It is most alarming that” the author “discloses information that he believes to be ongoing intelligence operations, including actions as critical as stopping dangerous nations from acquiring nuclear weapons. Setting aside whether what he wrote is accurate or inaccurate, it demonstrates an unfathomable and sad disregard for U.S. national security and those who take life-threatening risks to ensure it.”

By revealing this operation, which you acknowledge may be ongoing, aren’t you violating national security?

CONTINUED

< Prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | Next >

Discuss Story On Newsvine
Rate Story:
View popularLowHigh
Email
Instant Message
Print