For the Record - Brief Article - Column

National Review, March 25, 2002

-- In Fox News poll, President Bush's job-approval rating at 77 percent. Bush tours DMZ in South Korea, learns that axes used by North Koreans to kill two servicemen in 1976 are displayed in Communist museum: "No wonder I think they're evil." Bush, in address carried live on Chinese television: "Life in America shows that liberty, paired with law, is not to be feared. In a free society, diversity is not disorder. Debate is not strife. And dissent is not revolution. A free society trusts its citizens to seek greatness in themselves and their country." Bush on welfare reform: "Many Americans, in Bob Woodson's words, were injured by the helping hand. The welfare system became an enemy of individual effort and responsibility, with dependence passed from one generation to the next." Bush on Social Security reform: "I want America to be an ownership society, a society where a life of work becomes a retirement of independence." Bush stumps for Senate candidate Elizabeth Dole in North Carolina: "Somebody said to me the other day or actually asked me today, Am I going to campaign? And here we are in war. Do you think it's all right for the president to go campaign? I said, 'Yes, I do.'" Washington speculates on which Bush cabinet member will be first to resign, with attention focused on Norm Mineta at Transportation, Paul O'Neill at Treasury, and Tommy Thompson at Health and Human Services.

-- Deputy defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz: "There is still a great deal of work to be done. I do fear the country has not absorbed that the conflict is far from over." Tom Daschle criticizes war on terrorism: "I don't think the success has been overstated but the continued success, I think, is still very much in doubt."White House press secretary Ari Fleischer: "It's never easy to guess what the motives are of the loyal opposition. Obviously, there's going to be politics involved. Some people may want to run for president." Jimmy Carter on Bush's "axis of evil" statement: "The comment was overly simplistic and counterproductive. I think it will take years before we can repair the damage done by that statement." Sen. Robert Byrd (D., W.Va.): "If we expect to kill every terrorist in the world, that's going to keep us going beyond doomsday. How long can we afford this?" Wall Street Journal publisher Peter Kann on the killing of reporter Daniel Pearl: "His murder is an act of barbarism that makes a mockery of everything Danny's kidnappers claimed to believe in. They claimed to be Pakistani nationalists, but their actions must surely bring shame to all true Pakistani patriots." In CBS News poll, 74 percent approve U.S. attack to try to remove Saddam Hussein from power. Also, 59 percent say war on terrorism won't be "won" unless Osama bin Laden is captured or killed. Lt. Gen. Ronald T. Kadish says rudimentary missile- defense system capable of protecting against rogue attack from North Korea will be functional in 2004.

-- Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) on accepting donations from Global Crossing before it went belly-up, in AP: "I am tainted by this."Winter Olympics leader Mitt Romney (R.) considers challenging Acting Gov. Jane Swift (R., Mass.) in primary, with Boston Herald poll showing Romney able to beat all five Democratic opponents and Swift losing to three and in a tie with two. In South Dakota, Republican poll shows Rep. John Thune (R.) leading Sen. Tim Johnson (D.), 49 percent to 43 percent, in race GOP believes is best chance for defeating incumbent. James Charles Evers, brother of Medgar Evers and former NAACP leader in Mississippi, on judicial nomination of Charles W. Pickering Sr.: "The NAACP and the Klan are the only two organizations that are against him down here right now." Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D., Texas), head of Congressional Black Caucus, on who will vote for Pickering: "a few Judases."

-- Democrats in Texas gubernatorial primary hold debate in Spanish. Former Los Angeles mayor Richard Riordan on bilingual education: "It's worse than nonsense. It's downright evil." Three in ten claims for earned-income tax credit are false or fraudulent, costing taxpayers $8.5 billion per year, according to IRS report requested by Rep. Ernest Istook (R., Okla.)"The point I remember so clearly is Birch Bayh is hurt himself and he had the choice of either going down the road to [get help] or coming back to the plane and trying to drag people out," says Sen. Ted Kennedy (D., Mass.), recalling 1964 plane crash, in Roll Call. "In your mind, [with] the dangers of a fire in the plane, when you're off in the woods by yourself, you wonder what kind of choices you'd make. He made the decision to come back to the plane. It didn't catch on fire, but it could have. It was a clear reflection of the quality of his character and courage."

-- Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf on the Islamic world, according to BBC: "Today we are the poorest, the most illiterate, the most backward, the most unhealthy, the most unenlightened, the most deprived, and the weakest of all the human race." Russian foreign minister Igor Ivanov says Russia opposes military action against Iraq.