MTP Transcript for April 22, 2007

MR. WILLIAMS: Well, the Court basically said that it’s never medically necessary to have this, this, this particular kind of abortion that opponents call partial birth abortion, that a health exception isn’t needed because it’s never medically necessary, and that Congress, as a moral issue, could say “We’re going to ban this, and you don’t need a health exception.” The first time a particular ban was—a particular kind of abortion procedure was struck down, first time the Supreme Court said, “You don’t need a health exception.” And I think what’s telling about the decision, Tim, is that the language of the decision is considered the sort of thing that people who oppose abortion are saying, you know, “Finally the Supreme Court gets it.” It’s, it’s, it’s very incendiary language in terms of how they describe the procedure. It says that abortion, there is a moral component to it, and so it—people who oppose abortion think this is a great thing, people who think there should be abortion rights are very alarmed.

MR. RUSSERT: Jon Meacham, perhaps it was Virginia Tech and other issues that captured the news attention, but this decision by the Supreme Court was significant, and, yet again, the Democrats seem to have been relatively careful in their response to it.

MR. MEACHAM: Well, you’re right, we had a week where some of the most fundamental questions in our national life, in our politics were changed to some extent. The—this is the first Roberts court sign that the long-feared liberal, liberal fears that the court was going to turn right on these issues—this is the first time that there’s actually evidence that, that they will. Although the—as you know, the country is against this procedure, and there’s there’s popular—against that. The, the people are against it. I think you have Democrats who are still struggling to find out how do they signal to the broad American public that they share their values, that it’s a party that understands and believes—whether it’s religion or guns or life—that they, too, are in tune with the public. And it’s—the Democrats have a long history of being able to do this, but it’s been a long time since they have.

MR. RUSSERT: In terms of defining debate, Democrats are much more comfortable, it seems, Doris, debating a woman’s fundamental right to choose as opposed to the specifics of a partial birth abortion.

MS. GOODWIN: And I think it probably was smart for them, in the context of this week, not to come out will full guns blazing about how they’re going to respond to the Supreme Court. I think Jon is right, tone is, is critical right now, and I think they’re struggling to figure out a way to make sure that women can especially understand the potential threat that this might be to their right to choose, but without going out and sort of sounding like, you know, they’re—all the alarms are coming, because that’s not going to help them right now. This debate is so important, and it’s a long-term debate. And, in a certain sense, what’s on their side is that people are willing to fight more for something they fear than for something they already have. So now women are going to be afraid that something is going to go further along. And if they can tap that without making it sound like they’re in the middle of a big war cry—because the country doesn’t want to hear that. The country wants restrained tone, I think.

MR. RUSSERT: Women who are in favor of abortion rights, and there are women who are opposed to abortion rights, as well, who are fearful on the other side...

MS. GOODWIN: Exactly right.

MR. RUSSERT: ...that a Democratic president would change the balance of the court.

MR. GREGORY: You know what’s interesting, too, we’re talking about guns, we’re talking about abortion, and these are such polarizing issues. And you talk about the politics of 2008, you have this interest is really on both sides, in both parties to talk about politics in a much different way. The, the rationales for candidacies like Rudy Giuliani or Barack Obama to sort of get beyond that level of partisanship. And it gets very hard, because there’s such political peril in engaging these issues in any other way besides the way that they have been fought over time. And that makes it a real test to see if Democrats and Republicans really do want to engage.

MR. RUSSERT: One area, subject, debate where there seems to be bipartisanship is the future of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. I was stunned watching the hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Pete, where the Republicans seemed to be much more aggressive than many of the Democrats. And it strikes me as if the Republicans are much more anxious to see him go, step down, than the Democrats are. The Democrats kind of enjoying this notion of if he stays, the investigation continues, drip, drip, drip, and Republicans are suggesting let’s stop now. Here’s Lindsey Graham, Republican senator from South Carolina. Let’s watch.

(Videotape, April 19, 2007)

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): You said something that struck me, that sometimes it just came down to these were not the right people at the right time. If I applied that standard to you, what would you say?

(End of videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: Ouch.

MR. WILLIAMS: Well, you know, Arlen Specter called this Alberto Gonzales’ reconfirmation hearing. The problem is there’s not going to be a vote at the end of this. Alberto Gonzales is going on about his business. He’s made it very clear he wants to stay. He was at an awards ceremony Friday. He’s got a news conference coming up tomorrow on identity theft. He’s going to be appearing before Congress in May for a couple of hearings on the budget. It’s sort of the reverse of the usual process. In a confirmation, the White House sends it up to the Senate and says OK, you decide. Here, the Senate’s sort of making an entreaty to the president, saying you decide. On Friday the president reiterated his support for the attorney general. The attorney general says he wants to stay. His people think he did, given his sort of usual rhetorical style, in the Congress, they think he did about as well as could be expected. And I, I do think that the tone of the Senate has changed. This started out as an investigation of whether prosecutors were stopped from looking into corruption or there was some sort of pressure—political pressure that interfered with the justice system. It’s really become, now, a kind of referendum on the attorney general’s management style.

MR. RUSSERT: David Gregory, the White House staff, are they pushing back hard on you, in a—in an outright defense for the attorney general?

MR. GREGORY: No, and there’s nobody actually standing up and saying, “Well, he really acquitted himself well, and he, he pulled this off.” What they say is there’s no other revelation that really came out. If it it was a question of how this was handled, we admit it was handled extremely, extremely poorly, and people can make their judgments based on that. But should he lose his job for it? No, is their contention, and so they’ll stick by him. And this is, as one Republican said this to me, this is Bush being Bush. And if people think that Bush will throw him overboard if the heat gets too hot, but he won’t. He’ll stand by Alberto Gonzales as long as, as it’s possible. Or if he wants to remove him, may remove him on his own timetable. There’s also a recognition that to replace Alberto Gonzales now would only galvanize Democrats who want to keep going on this issue, want to get Karl Rove to testify and Harriet Miers. And that to do that would only help keep, keep the issue alive.

MR. RUSSERT: Doris.

MS. GOODWIN: And yet, on the other hand, keeping him there is like water torture. I mean, you know, he can learn, I think—President Bush—from Harry Truman. Because I think what’s behind the Republicans now speaking out against Gonzales—as we saw Lindsey Graham and Tom Coburn—is the idea that they know the war is unpopular, they know the president is unpopular, and there’s a sense of their own vulnerability because of the midterm elections. Just as Harry Truman had cronyism and corruption in those last days of his presidency, his war was unpopular, he was unpopular, but he had loyalty as his cardinal virtue, just as President Bush does.

MR. MEACHAM: Right.

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