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Morning News

Democratic National Convention: Reporters Roundtable on Gore's Night to Shine

Aired August 17, 2000 - 11:31 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, we have been given an invitation over to the big kid set here for our roundtable. We have our esteemed panel of journalists joining us today. We have "USA Today"'s Susan Page; from the "National Review," we have Rich Lowry; and from our own CNN convention analyst department, we have Farai Chideya.

Thank you for joining us, and gathering around the big kid set, as I like to call it.

First, any thoughts about John McCain? Disturbing, sad news out of Arizona that his melanoma has resurfaced, Farai?

FARAI CHIDEYA, CNN CONVENTION ANALYST: Of course, it is terrible. I mean, I think that this is one of these insidious forms of cancer. It is a big form of cancer in a small package.

And I think Senator McCain is someone who really has bridged kind of a partisan divide. And what is interesting to me, is that he is someone who young voters really respect.

When he spoke at the Shadow Convention, even though he plugged Governor George W. Bush, there was a lot of support for him because he is seen as a reformer, and I think a lot of people will be pulling for him.

KAGAN: Rich, this is a blow for the Republicans. He is huge out on the campaign trail.

RICH LOWRY, "NATIONAL REVIEW": No doubt about it. He has been very busy. Congressional candidates like having him there because he has some appeal to independents. He really, I think, was a trail blazer for defining what sells this year, which is character and leadership and authenticity. So there is no doubt it is a blow to the GOP.

KAGAN: Susan, and yet, there is not a better known fighter and survivor in this country than John McCain?

SUSAN PAGE, "USA TODAY": That is right. And we certainly shouldn't count him out. It was sort of interesting last night, Joe Lieberman made a comment about John McCain to the convention delegates. Now you couldn't find a more partisan crowd than the one that was in this hall last night, and yet still a great ovation for him.

KAGAN: You bring up Joe Lieberman. The speech last night was a huge success here in the convention hall. But how about out in America? What do you think?

PAGE: Well, I think, you know, it is sort of interesting that Joe Lieberman and Al Gore have sort of the same task in their two speeches. Joe Lieberman was say, hello, here I am. Let me introduce myself. Because I think most Americans had never heard of him until he was chosen to be Al Gore's running mate. And it's interesting that Al Gore has a kind of similar task tonight, even though he has been in the public eye much longer, 24 years in public life, eight years in the White House.

So I think, in that way, those two speeches really have similar sorts of purposes.

KAGAN: Rich, he introduced himself, but a lot of his critics would say the Joe Lieberman he introduced is not the Joe Lieberman many in Washington have known. Yes, he is warm. He was warm before. He is warm now, but he made some concessions. He talked about Affirmative Action, making it very clear that he is in favor of it; also talking about his civil rights record. He definitely was not talking about the conservative side of Joe Lieberman?

LOWRY: Right, well, I think this is the danger for Lieberman, is at the end of this whole process, he could be really diminished because his reputation was do dependent on being an independent and free-thinker. And he is going to have to be a hard-hitting partisan in this race.

But that said, I think last night was the first truly successful night for Al Gore. Monday night was all about Bill Clinton. Tuesday night was "Jurassic Park" liberal night. And last night, Lieberman, even if he has shifted left a little bit, it was still a fairly centrist performance.

It was a raucously pro-American speech. And when he looked at the camera, and said: If you are independent or undecided, there are three things I want to tell you: We are going to have progress without partisanship, and we are going to reform Washington -- those are two things that could have come out of Bush's mouth -- and the third goal was preserving the prosperity, which is in no-way a liberal goal necessarily.

So I thought, for the Democrats, it was a refreshing turn to the center.

KAGAN: It has been kind of an interesting year, if you could just take sound bites and say name this convention, it would be kind of...

CHIDEYA: That is true. I think what was interesting for me, listening to this speech, just purely on a campaign level, was that Lieberman has proven himself, I think, to be a more able campaigner than people expected him to. He has got a sort a wry wit, and there is a way that he turn a phrase and sort of stick the shiv into the Republican...

KAGAN: With a smile on his face.

CHIDEYA: With a smile, you know, and, yes, he had to make some concessions, but if he didn't, the core Democratic base would bolt. There is a lot of discontent simmering under the surface here about the centrism of this party. And I think that Cheney was a pick that really placated the core Republican base, and people were waiting here.

KAGAN: Not the right Republican base for Cheney, yes, that is what I mean by the core, the right-wing core, and people were waiting for Lieberman to make some concessions and he did.

LOWRY: I think that is absolutely right, but that is the reason why this convention has not helped Al Gore as much as it could. I mean, it has just been too liberal. You have had gay activists, you have had union bosses under criminal investigation, like Richard Trumka (ph), up on that stage.

CHIDEYA: And I think that it has been great that you've had someone representing the gay and lesbian community. I think that's a step forward.

LOWRY: It's not mainstream America, though, and that is why Bush appears early on to be getting a little bit of a bounce from the Democratic convention.

PAGE: There was something fun that happened last night that we shouldn't have missed which is the state that put Al Gore over the top in terms of winning the nomination, and that was Florida. And the Gore people arranged that -- had a previous state pass so that that could happen. That is because they intend to contest Florida. And that has been a Republican state, that is a where Bush's brother is the governor. That is a sign of how seriously the Gore campaign is going to take that. We are really seeing some signs in that of their strategy for the fall.

KAGAN: Is that their way of saying, well, sorry we didn't pick your senator to be our vice presidential running mate, but thanks for playing, here is a parting gift, we will let you put Gore over the top.

PAGE; Well, there were a couple of states vying for that, Massachusetts, North Carolina. I think this was really aimed at saying: I am going to go to Florida. I am going to contest Florida, even though it is part of your base.

CHIDEYA: Speaking of which, this was one of the most hotly contested states. We should point out that Gore and Bush are almost neck-and-neck with Nader playing the spoiler role potentially. I mean, Ralph Nader is more of a force here in California than he is almost anywhere else, and the whole issue of whether or not the Democratic Party is centrist or progressive really gets to the core here in California. KAGAN: And in that, doesn't Al Gore have a bigger challenge than George Bush does? He has people from the left going off the Green Party, he has people on the right side of the party heading towards perhaps the Republican Party, whereas George Bush seems to have everyone under one big happy, hungry tent to win.

PAGE: Well, we are seeing how much more complicated this convention is than the last one we were at, and that is because of that very fact. Gore continues to have to tend to his liberal base, he still has to reach out to centrists; he has got to the worry about the Green Party. George Bush has a straighter line to the presidency than Al Gore does.

KAGAN: Let's look ahead to tonight with that in mind. What does Al Gore need to do up on that podium?

PAGE: He needs to look like a leader, like a personable guy. He needs to make his case that he is ready to assume the mantle of the presidency, that he is not the vice president, that he is not the guy who stand behind the president looking kind of stiff and nodding his head.

LOWRY: Well, he has to talk about the economy and foreign policy successes of the administration. He has to talk about the issues where people agree with him,and he also needs to talk about how he has had a long -- a long history of public service, where there has been integrity, you know a couple Buddhist nun incidents aside.

But the most important thing is he has to convince people that they would be comfortable spending four years with him in their living rooms, and that is the toughest sell for Al Gore, and that is what I am not sure he can pull off.

KAGAN: And Farai, from everything that we have heard, it is going to be a big personification of Al Gore. You are going to see no fewer than nine of his friends up there introducing him, his wife.

CHIDEYA: Right, absolutely. I think that, honestly, people know that Al Gore is smart. People know that Al Gore knows policy. This election is about who is the most telegenic. We are sitting here in a television studio. George W. Bush can project. Al Gore has not projected himself yet. He is going to try to break through the fourth wall tonight.

LOWRY: The real worry is that he has projected himself and just people are not buying it.

PAGE: There is a model, though, 1998, George Bush was not in good shape, the current vice president trying to run for president. He got up at that convention in New Orleans, gave a wonderful speech, a powerful speech, we all know that Peggy Noonan wrote, but George Bush delivered it, George Bush the senior. And so, it does shows that the dynamic of elections can change. The dynamic that we see right now is not necessarily the one that we are going to see in October.

KAGAN: If you look at the two very successful warm-up acts by his friends, Bill Clinton, and now Joe Lieberman, can you make the case: With friends like these warming up the audience, who needs enemies? The bar has been set so high.

CHIDEYA: I honestly think that he probably will do well. I think that, given the preparation that has gone into this and given some of the quirky things that are going on. I mean, you know, Spike Jones doing a film for the campaign. Spike Jones is the guy who did the film "Being John Malkovich," and he has pulled in some unusual talent. I mean this is a much quirkier convention than the Republican convention.

So I actually think, I would look for an interesting speech that relies a lot on some personal detail from Gore's life. I expect to hear about his Vietnam experience. That is one thing i think that will come up. Notably, neither Cheney nor Bush served in Vietnam. And so we should look fro some personal details of his life.

KAGAN: Rich, what are you look for?

LOWRY: I think that the most convincing case for Al Gore was made by his daughter last night. I thought Karenna was terrific. She is gorgeous. She has an utterly winning personality. So my guess would be...

CHIDEYA: You are just mad that she is married.

KAGAN: That she is married and has a baby.

LOWRY: But my guess is, if there is one star from this convention that was born, it wasn't Harold Ford, it is probably not Joe Liebemran, I think maybe diminished by the end, I think that it's her. I think she was wonderful.

PAGE: Well, it's interesting, we all look for the next generation. In Philadelphia, we looked at George P. Bush, here we are looking at Karenna Gore Schiff.

KAGAN: We will have to look ahead. Susan Page, Rich Lowry, Farai Chideya. Why do I always mess up your name, I sorry. Thanks for joining us. Really appreciate it.

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