Howard Dean: 'Culture of corruption'

Norah O'Donnell Chief Washington Correspondent • Profile

Norah O'Donnell, Chief Washington Correspondent and guest host of 'Hardball,' sat down on Friday with Howard Dean to discuss soaring gas prices, sinking poll numbers and the national anthem sung in Spanish.  This is a transcript of their conversation.

NORAH O'DONNELL, GUEST HOST, "HARDBALL": What is it that the Democrats can do about high gas prices that the Republicans can't? 

HOWARD DEAN, DEMOCRATIC CHAIRMAN:  We can do a lot.  The first thing we would do is give back the $16 billion that the Republicans gave to the oil companies.  Here you have the spectacle of them giving away $16 billion worth of tax breaks, which are paid for by us and then we have got to pay $3 a gal on top of that.  That's not right.  If the Democrats had been if power, those kind of tax breaks never would have been given away. 

O'DONNELL:  President Bush said on Friday that he would reject calls in Congress for attacks on oil company profits.  He said the temptation in Washington is to tax everything.  Do you disagree? 

DEAN:  Well, I think the president is an oil guy.  What do you expect?  You know, the vice president came from Halliburton, the big drilling company.  The president has an oil background.  Of course, he doesn't want to tax the oil companies, but he doesn't have to give away our tax money to do that.  I can't believe that we are now giving $16 billion in tax breaks to oil companies as a result of this Republican administration. 

O'DONNELL:  But with all due respect, Mr. Chairman, ending that subsidy is not going to lower the price of gas at the pump. 

DEAN:  It may actually, however, have an effect on oil company profits, which don't have to come out of our pockets, and it could lower our taxes or lower the amount of deficit.  That would be something that would be a good thing. 

O'DONNELL:  OK. That's one part of the problem. But the issue that Americans care about is that when I go and fill up, that, you know, last month it was $30 and now it's $45 all of a sudden.  What can anybody in Congress do?  Tom Friedman wrote about this on Friday in “The New York Times.”  It doesn't appear that either party could do anything that would result in a quick fix? 

DEAN:  That's a huge part of the problem. I have talked about getting rid of the big tax breaks that the Republicans are giving to the oil companies.  The next thing is Iraq.  There's not anybody on the planet who believes that the situation in Iraq is not tied to high oil prices.  It has destabilized the world oil market, decreased the output from Iraq dramatically. 

Perhaps if we had different kind management in Iraq or perhaps if we hadn't gone in the first place, we wouldn't be seeing these problems either.  So I think it's much more likely that the Democrats, because we have better expertise in foreign policy and security than the Republicans do, and would do a better job keeping gas prices down. 

O'DONNELL:  Most experts who look at this and who study high gas prices and the oil industry say this is an issue about supply and demand and the United States is dependent on foreign oil, period.  And China needs more oil.  India needs more, and that's causing the prices of gas, oil, crude oil and then of course gas, to go up.  What is the Democratic plan for the future to reduce our dependence on foreign oil? 

DEAN:  Well, I just mentioned two things.  First of all, we'll be getting rid of those big subsidies that the Republicans are giving to the oil companies. 

Secondly, we will stabilize the situation in Iraq and bring our troops home eventually and quickly, much more quickly than the Republicans will and stabilize the world oil situation. 

Thirdly, I think you will find a much more friendly environmental approach in terms of using alternative sources of energy.  Let's not forget, the president and his party have done nothing about alternative sources of energy, such as wind, such as solar, such as getting better mileage out of our cars.  Nothing has been done by this oil-thirsty addicted Republican administration.

And I think if you really want environmental protection, which goes hand in hand with reducing our oil use, then you have got to have Democrats if office, as plain as that.  The American people know it. 

O'DONNELL:  So you're telling me that if in these midterm elections that if Democrats win, that Americans will see an immediate drop in the price of gas at the pump? 

DEAN:  What I'm telling you is that if Democrats win, we'll be able to stop the president from doing the kinds of things that he's done that have increased oil prices dramatically.  If Democrats win in these midterm elections, we still won't control White House, so it's hard to set the policy, for example, for the Department of Interior.

We'll stop the president's giving away our tax money to oil companies, and we will change the course of the war in Iraq.  We will pass and ask the president to sign the kind environmental legislation that will result in reduced oil use. 

O'DONNELL:  Let's turn to the issue of the shakeup that's going on in the White House as the president reorganizes in his second term of course.  Also, we have learned that Karl Rove testified for the fifth time before the grand jury this week.  His lawyers say, however, not to expect any indictment any time soon, that he may in fact get the all clear from the special prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald. 

If Rove gets the all clear, will you have been wrong all this time saying that he was involved? 

DEAN:  There's no question that Rove was the one that leaked the information about the CIA agent's name, and he still has security clearance.  So the presence of Karl Rove in the White House continually reminds the American people that the president wasn't truthful about firing leakers, in addition to not being truthful about a number of other things.  I think he's a big liability for the administration, as long as he's in the White House. 

O'DONNELL:  If Democrats win in the midterm elections in November, will the Democrats in Congress move to impeach this president? 

DEAN:  I doubt it.  It's possible.  I mean, no doubt, there will be investigations because there's been so much corruption in the White House and the vice president's office, even the Republican Senate president is under investigation for insider trading.  The Republican House leader had to resign.  The new Republican House leader just killed all the ethics legislation.

It's pretty much of a culture of corruption on the Republican side in Washington now, and I think you're certainly going to see some investigations. 

The Democrats believe that we need to do something about jobs, we need to fix our security or especially our port security.  We want honesty and openness back in our government, so we want to have real ethics reform.  That's a big list of important things. 

You know, unless there's a terrible smoking gun, I think impeachment is going to come pretty low on the list, because we have got to really turn this country around and that is a big job. 

O'DONNELL: Let's be honest. I mean, we just had the NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll come out.  And I know you probably took a look at that, and it shows that Congress's approval ratings are lower than the Republicans in Congress, lower than what the Democrats were in 1994.  And of course they lost control, so that might signal of course that Democrats might do well if the midterm elections.

But we also found in our polling that Americans out there don't think that the Democratic Party is much better.  Why can't you come up with a 10-point plan, put it on a web site, advertise it here on this program here today that shows the American people how you would do something differently? 

DEAN:  Well, other than advertising on this program here today, we actually have a six-point plan.  It is on our web site, and we have one million households that are going to have their doors knocked on, on Saturday.  We have a million doors going to be knocked on with a million flyers and the agenda is very clear. 

O'DONNELL:  And what's that knocking on doors supposed to do? 

DEAN:  It's supposed to show people what our message is, since we seem to have trouble getting it out.  It is very clear.  We want honesty and openness back in our government.  We want real security and a real strong defense based on telling the truth to our soldiers and our citizens. 

We want American jobs that will stay in America.  We want a health care system that includes everybody, like 36 other countries have.  We want a public education system that allows optimism and opportunity back in America again, and we want real retirement security. 

I think that's a great agenda for the Democratic Party.  We're all united from the Senate to the House, to the governors to the mayors in that agenda, and a million people are going to have that agenda in their hand by the end of this weekend. 

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