‘Meet the Press’ transcript for Nov. 18, 2007

MR. RUSSERT:  That’s in stark contrast to what Senator Clinton had said. Here she is in ‘04:  “I think, on balance, NAFTA has been good for New York and America.” Ron Brownstein, you’ve written in your book, “The Second Civil War,” about Bill Clinton.  You interviewed him and talked to him.

MR. BROWNSTEIN:  Mm-hmm.

MR. RUSSERT:  David Broder last week talked about what will the roll of Bill Clinton be in a Clinton administration, two presidents in one house, and how does that work out?  And you have an issue like trade here, which there appears to be a disagreement.  You had the president jumping in, defending his wife over the last couple weeks, sometimes very vociferously.  Tell us about your conversation.

MR. BROWNSTEIN:  OK, couple of things.  First of all, I think, if you look at Hillary Clinton and where she has positioned herself on, on, on a broad array of issues, on domestic issues she has been less willing to challenge conventional wisdom within the party than her husband.  She has been pulled back by, I think, by the greater partisan tide, whether it’s education, trade, entitlements.  She is less willing, I think, to sort of push against the party consensus, whereas on foreign policy she has been willing to take some risks to try to maintain a centrist position for the general election.

In the book, I had a very interesting conversation with Bill Clinton in which he talked about what he did wrong as well as what he did right about trying to reach out beyond the partisan divides that he inherited in 19--when he arrived in 1993.  And he offered some very specific advice to the next president about how to try to assemble a broader coalition and really try to reach out to voters who don’t necessarily agree with you.  Now this, of course, is a point of dispute in the Democratic race between Obama and Clinton, arguing about who could unite the country better.  And what was fascinating about the interview with Clinton was his insistence on finding issues where you can work with the other side.  Now, that’s something that Hillary Clinton—people who disagree with you on nine out of 10 issues, find the 10^th one, then you can build a habit of cooperation.  Clinton has been able to do that in the Senate, but on the presidential campaign trail—and I think that this Obama thing shows that—she—the other side of her has also come out, a very, very tough partisan who responds with a punch when she gets a punch.  And I wonder—the question, I think, for her is which one of these instincts would predominate if she becomes president?  Intellectually, I think she agrees with him on the importance of building broad coalitions, but, in her gut, she is a little more of a—kind of a street fighter in, in her initial response than former President Clinton.

MR. YORK:  But it’s, but it’s also how much of a role he will actually have and will he have some sort of power role.  And this is something that Democrats actually like this idea.  I mean, Republicans are terrified by it, but Gallup recently asked, “Would you like to see Bill Clinton play a policy role in a Hillary Clinton White House?” And Democrats said yes, 75/23; Republicans said no, 75/22.  The same...

MR. BROWNSTEIN:  Byron, Byron, they’ve been through that experience once, and it really didn’t work out that well the other way.

MS. IFILL:  And when some...

MR. BROWNSTEIN:  And I can’t imagine they’d want to go too far in that direction again in reverse.

MS. IFILL:  But was Senator Clinton part of the poll?

MR. YORK:  Yeah.

MS. IFILL:  I mean, does she get to, does she get to vote?

MR. TODD:  No, you have to ask, I think the way you have to ask it—look, Bill Clinton is a asset in the Democratic primary.  OK?  That is crystal clear, that is why he is going to spend almost as much time in Iowa as she is. But in the general, if she’s the nominee, they’re going to have to say exactly what he’s going to do, an exact job description because Joe Biden, I think, is the one who says, he goes, “Why would you want to be vice president?  He’s there.” I mean, you know, there is a—she is married to the vice president or the next—or the chief of staff, or the secretary of state or the secretary of treasury.

MR. DIONNE:  Did you know—first of all, I’m glad you mentioned Joe Biden. It’s probably one mention.  He’s had a bunch of good debates.  But what I wanted to do is talk about the trade issue.  People forget Bill Clinton finessed the trade issue, too, all the way through the ‘92 election.  If Bill Clinton were running now, I think he’d do exactly what Hillary Clinton is doing.  He didn’t really take a firm stand on that until the end of the campaign.

MR. BROWNSTEIN:  Mm.  Mm.  Mm.

MR. DIONNE:  Trade is one of those issues that really divides the Democratic Party between the old blue-collar, labor-oriented voters who are really angry about the loss of jobs and income, and the upscale Democratic voters who take free trade as a matter of principle.  This is a hard issue inside the party.

MR. RUSSERT:  Let’s go to the Republicans.  Here’s the latest poll in Iowa: Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, 27; Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, 18; Mayor Rudy Giuliani of New York, 16; Fred Thompson, 10.  The scrutiny of Huckabee now intensifies as he moves up in the polls. Thearkansasjournal.com, Club for Growth, has been circulating a tape of Mayor Huckabee talking to the—his state legislature back in 2003 about taxes. Let’s watch.

(Videotape)

FMR. GOV. HUCKABEE:  Again, let me state what I’ve said privately as well as publicly, but I want to get it on the record again:  There’s a lot of support for a tax at the wholesale level for tobacco, and that’s fine with me.

Others have suggested a surcharge on the income tax.  That’s acceptable.  I’m fine with that.  Others have suggested perhaps a sales tax.  That’s fine.  Yet others have suggested a hybrid that would collect some monies from any one or a combination of those various ideas, and if that’s the plan that the House and Senate agree upon, then you will have nothing but my profound thanks.

(End videotape)

MR. BROWNSTEIN:  Ooh.  Ooh.

MR. RUSSERT:  Max Brantley, who’s covered the governor for the Arkansas Times, has been a critic of the governor, had a story on salon.com, the headline, “The Dark Side of Mike Huckabee:  The national media seems to have a crush on our ex-governor, but here in Arkansas, we know better.” And he goes on to itemize some of the improprieties he thinks that Governor Huckabee of Arkansas engaged in.

Byron, what role will this tape, these kinds of articles, have on the Huckabee candidacy?

MR. YORK:  When I interviewed him about this around the time of the Iowa straw poll, which is what got him going, a lot of these things had not been talked about yet.  And he, you know, he makes his case, but I think one thing that you should point out is certainly the Club for Growth has been going after him on the issue of taxes, but not all Republican tax activists feel that way.  I talked to Grover Norquist, who’s head of American tax reform, and he said, “Well, he signed my pledge.  Ronald Reagan had raised taxes when he was governor.  And as long as he abides by my pledge, it’s OK.” So not all Republicans are attacking him on this tax issue.

MR. RUSSERT:  Mm.

MS. IFILL:  Is anybody else having a flashback, kind of a little acid flashback to 1991?  That same headline could’ve been written, “The Dark Side of Bill Clinton:  America has a crush on our ex-governor, but we know better.” We had a lot of that.  What is it about Arkansas?

MR. RUSSERT:  And Mike Huckabee is from Hope, Arkansas.

MR. TODD:  Yeah.

MS. IFILL:  Hope, Arkansas.

MR. DIONNE:  Yes, yes.

MR. RUSSERT:  The same town as Bill Clinton.  Mitt Romney has now jumped on Mike Huckabee’s position on immigration.  Huckabee had a program in the state where scholarships were given to illegal, the children of illegal immigrants. “Romney, seeking to protect his narrowing lead in Iowa, assailed” “Huckabee and Rudy Giuliani over supporting tuition breaks and broader sanctuary for illegal immigrants” on “their children.  ‘Giving a better deal to the children of illegal aliens than we give to U.S. citizens from surrounding states is simply not fair and not right.’”

Huckabee responded:  “Mitt Romney would rather keep people out of college so they can keep working on his lawn, since he had illegals there.” A story about Guatemalans working on Mitt Romney’s lawn service.

“Rudy Giuliani returned criticism from” “Romney by charging” “the former Massachusetts governor ‘probably has the worst record on illegal immigration.’ Giuliani asserted that the number of illegal immigrants ‘expanded dramatically’ while Romney was governor.”

Chuck, all these candidates trying to position themselves on immigration, but the fact is Romney and Giuliani, as governor and mayor, did have so-called sanctuary cities in their state, and had much more “progressive” records on immigration than they’re now letting on to.

MR. TODD:  Well, I think this is—they were—they’re prisoners of being on the coast, you know.  Immigration really is a geographic divide in this country, not a ideological divide.  I mean, it is, you know, if you—if you’re on the coast you’re a little more open to this idea that, you know, sometimes you can’t just legislate, you can’t just deport people, what are you going to do?  And, and Romney being a guy from Massachusetts, Giuliani being a guy from New York, that’s it.  But it’s interesting, you know, Fred Thompson’s first basically major issue ad is on immigration.  He hasn’t really had to vote on it.  He got to be an observer over these last three or four years.  So it allows him to be the tougher-on-immigration guy.  He comes across more, more authentic about it because he is—got that Southern accent down, and I think that’s playing well in Iowa.  He’s running it on Fox News nationally, which is a way to appeal to national Republican primary voters.  So it is, it is a huge divide in the party, and yet because the front-runners all have a flawed, flawed stance on it, it’s probably Thompson’s lone opening.  You know, we hadn’t really mentioned him here, but it is his lone opening in this race.

MR. BROWNSTEIN:  Well, you know, I mean, we, we—you’ve seen the reverse on—in, in some Democratic primaries on issues like guns, where the candidates, in competition with each other, get pulled away from the center to the left.  Certainly there is an arms race among Republicans to be the toughest on immigration.  And even someone like Rudy Giuliani, talking about “sanctuary cities,” which in his case amounts to a policy in New York City that said if you bring a child into an emergency room, we’re not going to ask you your legal status.  You know, you kind of wonder how he hasn’t pushed back and said, “Well, would you rather that child go into the school with a fever that hasn’t been diagnosed and sit next to your son or daughter in second grade?” The party is taking, I think, a very calculated risk here.  Obviously, there’s a lot of—there was a lot of backlash in ‘07 against comprehensive immigration reform.  There is still majority support, in polling, for a comprehensive approach that would, that would include a combination of tougher enforcement and a pathway to legalization.  And there is also the issue of what will happen with Hispanic voters.  The Republican vote declined from 40 percent in 2004 to 30 percent in 2006.  At 30 percent there are a number of states they would consider safe that would be at risk in a general election. So the party is taking a very calculated gamble as they all tumble over each other to respond to what is very clearly a real sentiment for Republicans.

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