Shias Revolt Against U.S. Occupation; Bush, Cheney Vow to Stay the Course
Aired April 5, 2004 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening again, everyone. I'm Anderson Cooper. Aaron Brown is off tonight.The news once again from Iraq is both disturbing and, if you agree with the critics of the American presence there, ominous. For months now, American military planners have been concerned about what they see as the worst of two worlds, fighting against the minority Sunnis and their bastion in Fallujah and, at the same time, fighting the more radical Shias, especially in their stronghold called Sadr City in the heart of the capital.Both of those events have now happened and though American soldiers and their Iraqi counterparts are striking back, the outcome is far from certain. It was a busy deadly weekend in Iraq and the events there will play a large part in our reporting tonight.The whip starts off first stop Baghdad and CNN's Walter Rodgers, Walt a headline.
WALTER RODGERS, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, the Americans got a glimpse of their worst nightmare in Iraq, an armed Shiite revolt against the occupation over the weekend. It had to be more than a little sobering for the folks in Washington -- Anderson.
COOPER: Walt, back to you shortly.On to the Pentagon and a number of questions, our Chief Pentagon Correspondent Jamie McIntyre has the watch tonight, Jamie a headline from you.
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Anderson, after months of insisting that the U.S. didn't need additional troops in Iraq the top U.S. commander has asked his planners to draw up options for more troops just in case. Admission of a miscalculation or is it just, as one Pentagon official said, prudent planning for an option that will probably never be exercised?
COOPER: We shall see.Next to the politics of war in an election year, John King our Senior White House Correspondent on the road tonight in New Orleans with Vice President Cheney, John a headline
.JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, both the president and the vice president today said the United States will not be driven from Iraq by terrorists and thugs, as they put it, but the president's Democratic opponents said Mr. Bush has failed the diplomatic test. Another leading Democrat calling Iraq today Mr. Bush's Vietnam -- Anderson.
COOPER: Finally to Boston, not closure in the priestly sex abuse scandal but a milestone just the same. CNN's Dan Lothian with the story for us, Dan a headline.
DAN LOTHIAN, CNN BOSTON BUREAU CHIEF: Well, Anderson, it is yet another agreement in the clergy's sexual abuse scandal. Four alleged victims who filed lawsuits of one but they still want their case to go to criminal court -- Anderson.
COOPER: Back to all of you in a moment.Also on the program tonight, the tragic story of a young Tampa schoolteacher and the hit-and-run accident.Also the young man the U.S. military is doing its best to arrest, Sheikh al-Sadr, and why so many Iraqis are answering his call for violence. Retired General Wesley Clark is here with his take on the situation.And on the other side of the world, baseball by the numbers. Listen up Mr. Steinbrenner. How to get the most of your money. Author Michael Lewis joins us a bit later, all that to come in the hour ahead.We begin tonight with the turmoil in Iraq and the possibility, many would say the growing possibility, of more to come. Even before the events of the weekend, the events of today, the situation was incendiary. Tonight, it is explosive and complicated and that much more costly in lives, not just American lives either.It may also be the beginning of a more overt, more violent phase of the struggle for who controls Iraq when power is put back into Iraqi hands and at the center of that jockeying for power tonight sits a Shiite cleric who is now a wanted man.Here again, CNN's Walter Rodgers.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RODGERS (voice-over): These Iraqis are followers of the fiery Muslim Sheikh Moqtada al-Sadr, the man the United States says is behind an armed Shiite revolt against coalition forces over the weekend.In Baghdad alone, Sadr's outlawed militia killed eight American soldiers Sunday. The United States is now pressing an outstanding arrest warrant for their leader.
BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT, COALITION SPOKESMAN: He is free to surrender. He is free to walk into any police station. He will be treated the same way every other alleged criminal in the Iraqi justice system is treated.
RODGERS: Branded an outlaw by the United States, Sadr is violently anti-American and pro-Iranian. He's promised an intifada against the occupation here. Most of his victims so far, however, are Iraqis, killed in violence spawned by his militia filling local morgues.Sunday's violence spilled into Monday in violence ridden Shiite neighborhoods that fired at helicopters which in turn fired back sending smoke columns above Baghdad. Because this revolt was spawned by radical Shiites who have heretofore been quiet, a general worried allowed.BRIG.
GEN. MARTIN DEMPSEY, CMDR. 1ST ARMORED DIVISION: If it gains some kind of popular sympathy that eventually becomes popular support, then we have a challenge on our hands.
RODGERS: In Fallujah, the epicenter of violence with Sunni Muslims, U.S. Marines reestablished control hunting those who ambushed and killed four American civilians a week ago this in an ongoing operation.
(END VIDEOTAPE)R
ODGERS: All this violence, first Sunni and then Shiite could be an aberration. If not, however, and if the radical Shias and Sunnis were to join forces the United States could find itself in an extremely uncomfortable position here -- Anderson.
COOPER: Walter, this arrest warrant was apparently issued a while back, according to the U.S., but we really had not heard anything about it until today. Why today all of a sudden has this been announced?
RODGERS: Because of the violence over the weekend and that violence was, according to the coalition, particularly the United States, sparked and ignited by Moqtada al-Sadr's al-Mahdi Army. Now that's an illegal militia but they were out on the street doing Sadr's bidding. The United States is more than a little angry. At least eight Americans were killed Sunday. The Americans want this man shut down. The question is do they have the troops or the courage to do it? The consequences could be enormous -- Anderson.
COOPER: Explosive indeed. Walter Rodgers thanks.Long before the first soldier landed in the region the number of troops needed to do the job was a bone of contention both inside the military and out. Now, CNN has learned that after insisting for months that no additional forces are needed, the top American commander is asking for options just in case.With that, here's CNN's Jamie McIntyre.
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MCINTYRE (voice-over): A weekend of violent demonstrations by Iraqi Shiites so concerned U.S. Central Commander General John Abizaid sources say he ordered up options for a quick infusion of additional U.S. troops if needed. A senior Pentagon official called it prudent planning for a worst case scenario in the unanticipated event violence gets out of control but as of now U.S. commanders believe there are adequate forces on the ground and so far there is no request for additional troops.Because the U.S. is in the middle of a massive troop rotation it actually has a temporary spike in the number of troops in Iraq from 120,000 at the beginning of the year to roughly 134,000 today. Commanders routinely reposition troops within Iraq and sources say shifting troops already in the country to trouble spots is far more likely than deploying additional troops.Still, the contingency planning itself shows how concerned the Pentagon is about the problem in Baghdad and farther south for up to now the Iraqi Shiite majority has been mostly cooperating with the U.S.-led occupation force.Unlike in Fallujah, a Sunni stronghold where the U.S. is convinced a forceful crackdown by U.S. Marines will break the anti- American resistance, neutralizing the fire brand Muslin cleric who sparked this weekend's violence requires more finesse.The U.S. wants to arrest Moqtada al-Sadr without inflaming Shiite passions or making him a martyr. The U.S. insists al-Sadr is a minor cleric on a power grab whose outlawed militia numbers less than 3,000.
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MCINTYRE: Today, a very senior military official vowed that al- Sadr will be captured or killed -- captured, rather, sooner rather than later and he also vowed that they would disband and disarm his private army but the U.S. military is biding its time. It's believed that al-Sadr is hiding in a mosque or religious area and the last thing the U.S. wants to do is be seen as desecrating a Shiite religious site and, therefore, inciting a backlash from the Shiite community -- Anderson.
COOPER: So, what would the strategy be then wait until he travels somewhere, wait until -- I mean is there a sense that there is great human intelligence on the ground that the U.S. has a sense of where this man is at all times?
MCINTYRE: Well, the statement that I heard from officials today is we're not in a big hurry that we feel like we have to get him tomorrow or the next day but we will get him and they'll be watching for an opportunity, watching for a time when they can minimize the impact and they're also putting some pressure on the Iraqis to see if they can get them to put some pressure on him and even perhaps carry out the arrest.
COOPER: All right, Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon, thanks Jamie. On now to the president, growing pressure on the White House to rethink the time table for the political handover in Iraq and shrinking approval for Mr. Bush's handling of the situation this according to some new polling done after the attack in Fallujah but before the uprising this weekend.For the latest on that side of things we turn once again to CNN's John King traveling with the vice president in New Orleans. Good evening, John.KING: Good evening to you, Anderson.And several reminders today of the political wildcard that the Iraqi situation is in this presidential campaign year. Both the president and the vice president on the road today, Mr. Bush in North Carolina then in Missouri, the vice president traveling to Ohio, then ending up in Louisiana tonight, both trying to focus on their campaign priorities but both also having to deal with this violent situation in Iraq.The president himself made clear that he supports the arrest warrant for that Shiite cleric. The president also, though, adamant in saying that the United States will stick to its deadline and will transfer sovereignty to a new Iraqi government on June 30th.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We will stay the course. We will do what is right. We will make sure that a free Iraq emerges not only for our own security but for the sake of free people's everywhere. A free Iraq will change the Middle East. A free Iraq will make the world more peaceful. A free Iraq will make America more secure. We will not be shaken by thugs and terrorists.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: An identical message from Vice President Cheney tonight here in New Orleans at a fund-raising speech. He said very much the same thing that the thugs and terrorists are trying to drive the United States out. Mr. Cheney vowing that would not happen.Back in Washington, though, and around the country, Democratic criticism of the president intensifying. His Democratic opponent John Kerry saying Mr. Bush has failed the diplomatic test and that he should immediately explain to the American people just how he plans to turn over sovereignty to the Iraqis less than three months from now. And Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts today delivering a blistering speech in which he called Iraq Mr. Bush's Vietnam. And, Anderson, of course the president could face the very difficult choice if General Abizaid decides he does want more troops. Mr. Bush had hoped to bring the troop levels down this election year but he, of course, is on record many times saying that if the commanders want more troops they will get them -- Anderson.
COOPER: John, did you get the sense that anyone at the White House was surprised that the information about General Abizaid sort of floating out these options, looking into the options of perhaps getting more troops was it a surprise that that information came out today?
KING: It is never a surprise when information leaks. It is perhaps viewed as unfortunate politically because of the timing of these things. It is certainly an issue that they would rather not have in the campaign.There are already all those other questions. Why is there so much violence? Why such anti-American sentiment? There's still no plan at all for who the United States will hand over sovereignty to, so this is yet another political wildcard, a major question that could, we should emphasize could, be looming over the president but they're never surprised when there are leaks. They may not like them but they're not surprised -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right, John King thanks very much.There's a lot to sort out here and joining us in that effort tonight, General Wesley Clark, who as you know was one of the contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination. Among the issues facing the administration, the possibility at least of more American troops on the ground and the possibility as well, the very last thing Americans want to hear in Iraq, civil war. General Clark thanks very much for being with us.
GEN. WESLEY CLARK (RET.), FORMER NATO SUPREME ALLIED COMMANDER: Good to be with you, Anderson. Remember, I was also one of your military analysts here.
COOPER: Yes, of course. Yes, I well remember. Do you -- is it at the point of possibility? I mean that word civil war is one we haven't heard much talked about the last couple of weeks.
CLARK: It's always been a risk in Iraq that this could happen and there were always those who crowed you see, see there's no civil war, but it was always too soon.
COOPER: Is the risk greater tonight?
CLARK: Yes. The risk is building because what the U.S. presence there has done is it's released fractionating forces inside Iraq that Saddam Hussein kept suppressed. Now, we're at a really critical juncture here. What we need is a strong military -- set of military tactics to deal with the insurgents in Fallujah and the Sunnis and, at the same time, we need enough forces there to handle civil strife with the Shia.
COOPER: So, is a military solution possible?
CLARK: No.
COOPER: I mean is this something that can be solved through the military?
CLARK: No, but you can lose it militarily. You can't win it militarily but you could lose it so...
COOPER: What exactly does that mean?CLARK: If John Abizaid needs more troops, then I would hope the administration would supply them and promptly as many as he needs. In other words, you don't want to be run out, we don't want to be run out of Fallujah and we don't want to have another situation where there's chaos in the streets of Najaf or in Baghdad where we don't have enough forces to control that and handle it.But, on the other hand, the military cannot succeed in quelling this. Ultimately, it requires a political solution, which means a political strategy, which means first coming to terms with the fact that the Shia are the majority in Iraq. Ultimately they will be the most powerful force in shaping the future of the country.The distribution of power among the factions in the Shia group has not been resolved. There's Iranian influence there. There are those who are more radical, those who are more moderate. We need to work with all of them, not with Chalabi and that's the problem.
COOPER: So by acknowledging, as you say, the Shia predominance in Iraq, are you basically indicating a desire to bolster say al- Sistani, other clerics other than Sadr because there is this internal battle going on among these Shiite clerics and there are some who say al-Sadr is basically making a move to sort of bolster his own position internally?
CLARK: Right. I think we need to be doing more with Sistani and what we need to do is get the conflict between them moved to a political level rather than resolved by force of arms. But to do that requires dealing with all of the contending parties, not showing our hands of favoritism too soon, leaving this up to the Iraqi people themselves to decide within certain broad guidelines.In other words, it means you have to approach it by understanding that you cannot win this with a military strategy. There's no magic military strategy to keep people off the streets. You have to take the steam out of it by dealing with it politically.
COOPER: What's your take on -- the Marines in the last weeks and months have talked a lot about sort of their approach to what's going to happen and Fallujah I guess is going to be a case study in this. Now we're told they have sealed off the city. They're on the outskirts. They're not allowing people in and out. There's a curfew. Can that be successful? I mean is the way they plan on going about it do you think a better way than was being gone after before?
CLARK: It's a really tough thing to call from a distance. You really have to be there and look at each of the incidents. You have to talk with the people on the ground and I would hope that the commanders there are doing that. At the outset when we went into Fallujah and we were there with I think it was the 3rd Armored Cav originally, we took some resistance. We took some casualties and the idea was well let's train the Iraqi police and let them handle it because we're being provocative just by being there.The Marines learned from that. They thought they would extend this but we cannot allow tactically the situation to occur that occurred in Fallujah where basically unarmored vehicles are ambushed and it's not safe for Americans to go in there. That's just -- it's against the law. It's murder essentially what happened and that can't be tolerated.So, if the authorities there cannot deliver the killers themselves, then it warrants an intrusive U.S. presence but here's the point to underscore, that's only tactics. That won't win. That will keep us from being run out but to win we have to have a political strategy. The difficulty with the administration is that they have not been able to get past their support of Ahmed Chalabi, their favorite.
COOPER: They're too invested in him you're saying?
CLARK: Right. To be able to create a broader political strategy we simply have to do this to be successful.COOPER: And very briefly the June 30 deadline that has to stay, has to remain?
CLARK: I think that has to stay but what exactly it means is less clear now. I hope that it will mean right now that we'll take heed to this and try to bring all of the Shia factions together and let them work through peaceful means to resolve their quarrels.
COOPER: All right. General Wesley Clark thanks very much, always good to see you.
CLARK: Thank you, Anderson.Well, coming up on NEWSNIGHT, another chapter in the Boston clergy abuse case as four defendants settle out of court for a significant amount.Also four children, all siblings, all under the age of 14, and all the victims of a hit-and-run. From New York this is NEWSNIGHT.
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COOPER: How much is a childhood worth? Is there any amount of money that can make up for years of abuse and betrayal? Or is any settlement, no matter how large, just a down payment on a debt the Catholic Church in Boston will never finally pay off?Today, four more young men agreed to drop their civil cases against the archdiocese. In return they received undisclosed cash settlements, money that will never make them whole but at least acknowledges their pain, pain allegedly caused by a priest that one of the lawyers called a human wrecking ball.Dan Lothian has more.
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LOTHIAN (voice-over): One more chapter closes in the Boston clergy sex scandal, the archdiocese agreeing to settle four civil cases involving former priest Paul Shanley for an undisclosed but "significant amount.
"ERIC MACLEISH, PLAINTIFF'S ATTORNEY: This is a milestone, I think, that has been reached today in this settlement, which will provide much needed assistance for people who badly need it.
LOTHIAN: Gregory Ford and Paul Busa are two of the four alleged victims who have gone public accusing Father Shanley of raping them at a suburban Boston church in the 1980s when they were young boys. Pleased with the agreement but said to still be traumatized, Ford spoke through his sister.
KATHRYN FORD, GREGORY'S SISTER: I would like to move forward with my life in a quiet manner.
LOTHIAN: The archdiocese is trying to move forward too.
FATHER CHRIS COYNE, ARCHDIOCESE OF BOSTON: We're glad that we were able to come to a settlement with the families but we also are very much still saddened by what happened and recognize that what happened was a tragedy.
LOTHIAN: Ford and the three others opted out of last year's landmark settlement with the Boston Archdiocese involving more than 550 victims, pursuing instead individual lawsuits. The latest agreement came in part, say attorneys, because of compelling evidence they were ready to present in court, such as documents and witness interviews.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Could you, in fact, identify the two voices you heard in the bathroom on those occasions?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
LOTHIAN: Allegations against Shanley were exposed about two years ago. After more than 70,000 documents were uncovered the priest abuse scandal exploded eventually bringing down Boston Cardinal Bernard Law. Shanley was ultimately arrested and charged with multiple counts of child rape. The criminal case continues despite the settlement agreement.
MACLEISH: Our office, as well as the victims, will continue to do anything we can to secure Father Shanley's position in a jail cell for the rest of his natural life.
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LOTHIAN: Shanley is currently free on $300,000 bail staying at an undisclosed location in the state. His criminal trial is expected to begin in October. Now, CNN attempted to reach his attorney today for a comment but he did not return our calls -- Anderson.
COOPER: So, the trial is -- for Shanley in October is it one case, how many cases, I mean how many charges does he face do we know?
LOTHIAN: Right. He faces multiple charges. Ten of the counts have to do with child rape but he's charged in four specific rape charges against these alleged victims. Three of those victims are some of the ones who were in this, involved in this settlement today.
COOPER: So, even though they were involved in this separate settlement they will still take part in the criminal proceedings?
LOTHIAN: That is correct. They did win this settlement but they still plan to take part in the criminal proceedings, their attorneys saying that they will be there and helping the prosecution on the witness stand.
COOPER: All right. Dan Lothian thanks very much from Boston tonight.What actually happened five days ago in the gathering dusk of a Florida evening is still unclear. Were there two cars involved or only one? Did someone driving by in a van witness what happened and just keep on going? The aftermath sadly was very clear. Four children, brothers and sisters, were hit while crossing a Tampa street by a driver or drivers who then drove away, drove away leaving two children dead and a community wondering how this could happen. Today there were some answers, not all the answers, but at least some.Susan Candiotti reports.
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JENNIFER PORTER, DRIVER: I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Five days after a fatal hit-and-run, Jennifer Porter sat before cameras, her eyes fixed on a brief written statement and apologized to the victims' mother.
PORTER: I wish there was more that I could say to ease your pain. I know there is nothing I can do to bring your two precious sons back, Bryant and Deronte (ph).
CANDIOTTI: As her family watched, Porter and her attorney chose their words carefully. Neither technically acknowledged she was the driver of a car that struck and killed two young brothers who were crossing a Tampa street last Wednesday. Neither would discuss what happened or why the 28-year-old grade school dance teacher left the scene without stopping.
BARRY COHEN, PORTER'S ATTORNEY: No one knows how he or she will react in the face of what Jennifer was faced with, frightened beyond imagination.
CANDIOTTI: At a weekend vigil, victims Bryant Wilkins, 13, and his 3-year-old brother Deronte were remembered. Their 8-year-old sister, who has spoken with police and 2-year-old brother survived their injuries. Police say they're still looking for a van with possible witnesses. They say another car might also be involved in the hit-and-run.Porter's family contacted the lawyer two days after the accident and he called police. Before Porter came forward, the victims' mother spoke publicly.
MALISSA WILKINS, VICTIMS' MOTHER: Whoever hit my baby I know you're probably scared and I hold no hatred toward nobody.
CANDIOTTI (on camera): Police have not yet made any arrests. They say they're still collecting evidence from Porter's seized car and are interviewing witnesses. Porter's attorney says she is cooperating with police but won't explain how. For now he's not allowing her to speak with authorities because, as he puts it, she's dealing with a lot of tough issues.Susan Candiotti, CNN, Miami.
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COOPER: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, some call him the son of Saddam. Some call him an outlaw. The U.S. military calls him wanted. Straight ahead a look at Sheikh al-Sadr.
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COOPER: Well, as we said, Iraq's provisional governing authority has issued an arrest warrant for the Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. It was a warrant issued sometime ago but only put into genuine effect after the bloody weekend of violence. He is a man, it seems, determined to take power and determined not to share it with any other Shiite leaders. Some background now from CNN's Jim Clancy.
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JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Moqtada al-Sadr was all but unknown outside Iraq when the U.S.-led coalition invaded a year ago. The 31-year-old Shia leader is the son of a respected cleric, killed under the rule of Saddam Hussein.Some say in a way he is also a son of Saddam for Moqtada al-Sadr has undeniably inherited the ability to parlay his political savvy and ruthlessness into power. An outlaw is how U.S. Civilian Administrator Paul Bremer describes al-Sadr. It's an opinion not formed yesterday. A year ago, the U.S. brought Abdel-Majid al-Khoei to Najaf. An Iraqi exile, al-Khoei was pro-Western, anti-Saddam and he had impressive Shia credentials. He also had CIA money to pay city salaries. With U.S. and British support, he seemed destined to play a major role in a new Iraq. But in time measured only in days, Abdel-Majid al-Khoei was dead. (on camera): All accounts say the pro-Western al-Khoei was hacked to death with knives after being chased by a mob from inside the Imam Ali mosque in Najaf. Many say it was an internal power struggle among Iraq's Shia Muslims, pointing a finger at Muqtada al- Sadr and his militant supporters. Sadr vehemently denies it. But one year later, arrest warrants are pointing in that same direction.
DAN SENOR, COALITION PROVISIONAL AUTHORITY: An Iraqi judge issued an arrest warrant for Muqtada al-Sadr. And that is based on evidence that connects Muqtada al-Sadr to the brutal murder of Mr. al- Khoei.
CLANCY (voice-over): The weekend clashes in four Iraqi cities coincided with mounting concern after the arrest of one of al-Sadr's key aides. Rumors that he also would be charged had certainly reached Muqtada al-Sadr himself. In the streets of Sadr City on Monday, after a night of clashes, Sadr supporters stressed the urgency of the situation. Wearing a hood and clutching a hand grenade, one said they would make Iraq the Americans' graveyard. "We have seven American prisoners and we'll trade them for our prisoners," he declared, a claim the U.S. military flatly denied. Muqtada al-Sadr has retreated to his mosque in Kufa, surrounded by his followers and not within easy reach of Iraqi police. But the militant young cleric can also count on his network of supporters across Iraq, who chant "long, long, long live Sadr." Charitable groups he inherited from his father have distributed aid to the needy. He's been against the occupation from the start. He has challenged its authority, setting up his own courts and his own prisons. Now he has challenged it with guns on the streets.
BRIG. GEN. MARK HERTLING, U.S. ARMY: He's trying to intimidate people, as the political process continues on.
CLANCY: Some argue al-Sadr is inpatient, that he misjudged the coalition badly. But the real question yet to be answered is whether Muqtada al-Sadr will emerge from it all stronger or weaker. Jim Clancy, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: And Joining us now is Rod Nordland, Baghdad bureau chief for "Newsweek" and safe to say a very busy man. We're pleased he had a spare moment for us. Rod, the U.S. military points out al-Sadr has been a minor figure in Iraq. Does he still appear like a minor figure there tonight?
ROD NORDLAND, BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF, "NEWSWEEK": Well, I think he's getting a big boost by being the center of attention. And it may just well be that he ends up some sort of martyr here and much more powerful than we ever thought he would be. One of the reasons -- they have had this arrest warrant for him apparently for months. And one of the reasons they probably have hesitated to execute it is because they wanted to avoid just that, making him a much bigger figure than he really is.
COOPER: The U.S. went to great pains to point out that it was an Iraqi judge who actually issued this arrest warrant, but does that really play in Baghdad right now, that angle to it? I would imagine it is hard to see this as anything but the U.S. going after this cleric.
NORDLAND: Well, sure. The entire government is appointed by the United States right now, including the judges, either directly or indirectly. And that point is not lost on anybody. Plus, the only party that has the force necessary to actually execute an arrest warrant is the United States. I can't imagine that the Iraqi police will do it. There is even some accounts of Iraqi police in Najaf actually changing sides and joining Muqtada al-Sadr's people.
COOPER: Because I guess some of these Iraqi police or a lot of them were originally recruited from some of these militias. They were the natural go-to people to fill the police ranks.
NORDLAND: In some cases. I think in most cases, though, they have gone outside of that. They've also been recruited from former policemen and just independently as well.
COOPER: How do the other Shia clerics -- what is the next step for them? How do they respond to this? Because there are internal power struggles going on within the Shia movement, among these clerics. Do they then either -- I guess they're forced to either decide between Sadr and the U.S.
NORDLAND: Well, the prominent clerics who form the house -- and especially Ayatollah Sistani, have been fairly moderate all along. And, at the same time, Muqtada al-Sadr has not -- has never criticized them. He looks to them as his religious guidance as well. Now what has happened, and it is very worrisome, is that Sistani issued a statement basically criticizing the Americans and their action in regard to Muqtada al-Sadr and asking people to support him. He also calls for calm. And it is a fairly -- like most of his statements, it's fairly moderate. But it is very worrisome if people interpret that as a signal that they should support Muqtada al-Sadr. Instead of the few thousand people he's been able to command before, he may well get massive numbers in the streets.
COOPER: And I read a statement that Sadr made I guess through others in which he was calling for anything but calm, not even calling for demonstrations. He was calling -- I believe the word he used was terrorize. He suggested his followers terrorize the U.S. and other allied forces.
NORDLAND: That's right. And that was in response to the shutting down of his newspaper and the arrest of his aides. And the temperature has been ratcheting up. Even more worrisome is his support for the people in Fallujah who are Sunni Arabs and some indications that they're throwing their support toward him. And there is a very serious risk here of the radical Sunnis and the radical Shias throwing their lot in together.
COOPER: Of the military people you talk to on the ground in Iraq, do they seem confident that there a military solution to any of this?
NORDLAND: Well, there is military solution to arresting Muqtada al-Sadr. But it could be very messy. And that could just inflame the situation even farther. There is a military solution to Fallujah. They can go in and do anything they want to in Fallujah, but, again, it is going to be at quite a cost. And the real risk now is that these two very separate issues and conflicts risk kind of blowing things up and bringing very two different elements in against the United States for the first time.
COOPER: Rod Nordland, appreciate you joining us on the program tonight. Thank you very much. Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, hot dogs, peanuts and beer. Mmm, beer. It can only mean one thing, opening day in America. We'll talk to author Michael Lewis just ahead.
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COOPER: Well, some other stories now making news around the world. The U.N.'s top nuclear inspector is in Iran with some tough words for the Islamic republic. Mohamed ElBaradei was asked why the visit given Iran's cooperation. "I think," he replied, "the question does not necessarily reflect the facts." Mr. ElBaradei says Iran needs to do more. He'll make the case to the Iranian leadership in person tomorrow. Flash flooding killed at least 21 people today in a town on Mexico's northern border. It happened just south of Eagle Pass in Texas. Another five dozen people have been reported missing.And in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, a shoot-out between security forces and a pair of suspected Islamic militants. According to authorities, it began when police tried to stop a car with stolen plates. The men inside opened fire. Police gave chase, shooting out the tires, killing one suspect and finally wounding the other. Well, tonight's "Moneyline Roundup" begins with the fallout from a giant bank merger. Bank of America says, as a result of merging with Fleet bank, it will shed 12,500 jobs. The cuts will be spread out over the next two years and about a third will come from attrition. New numbers tonight, wholesale prices went up slightly in February one-tenth percent. This is better than expected and a sign that inflation won't be a concern for some time yet. This also gave markets a shot in the arm, sending the Dow and the S&P up a nice chunk of change for the day. And coming up ahead on NEWSNIGHT, not guilty by reason of insanity, how one Texas woman is getting away with killing two of her children. Around the world, this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, there was no question about what happened. On Mother's Day last year, Deanna Laney smashed rocks into the heads of her three young children. The two older boys, 6 and 8, died. And the youngest, only 2 years old, is maimed for the rest of his life. The only question was why. Why did she do it? Yesterday, a jury concluded it was a question that didn't have an answer that the rest of us could understand. Eric Philips has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We the jury find unanimously and by a preponderance of the evidence the defendant Deanna Laney not guilty by reason of insanity.
ERIC PHILIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): An emotional Deanna Laney learned she would not be going to prison for killing two of her children. She was found not guilty by reason of insanity.
DEANNA LANEY, ACQUITTED BY REASON OF INSANITY: I feel like that I obeyed god.
PHILIPS: Laney said in this videotaped deposition that god told her to kill her children. Mental health experts say she was suffering from severe delusions.
DR. PARK DIETZ, PSYCHIATRIST: She believed this was a trial by god and that after killing the children, they would be resurrected. LANEY: That's what I was told to do and that's what I had to do.
PHILIPS: Prosecutors argued that Laney was not insane, that she acted normal in the hours before bashing her son's head with rocks, the stonings killed two of the boys, 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke and permanently injured their 2-year-old brother Aaron.
MATT BINGHAM, SMITH COUNTY DA: That day started out like any other day in the life of the Laney family with her manifesting zero, none outward signs of trouble to anyone.
BUCK FILES, LANEY'S ATTORNEY: You cannot understand what is going through her mind and see how it looks to her because of this psychotic illness. PHILIPS: The jury agreed that Laney was insane at the time of the violent killings. She will be held at a maximum security state hospital until doctors say she is well enough to be released. Eric Philips, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: A few more items now from around the country, starting in Dallas with an update on Ahmed and Mohamed Ibrahim. They're the Egyptian boys who were joined at the head when they were born. Surgery last fall separated them. And today, we learned they left the hospital a few days ago. Remarkable pictures, these. They still have several operations ahead of them. But, for the first time ever, they'll be living in a home away from the hospital with their family. A new survey of customer satisfaction is good news for budget airlines. Three of the top four performing carriers last year were of the low-fare variety. JetBlue came in first. Alaska and Southwest took the silver and bronze. America West rounded out the field. And "The L.A. Times" came out on tops in the Pulitzer Prizes, winning five. That is the second most ever won by a paper, exceeded only by "The New York Times," which won seven in the aftermath of 9/11. Still ahead tonight on NEWSNIGHT, ah, that time of the year again, that time when the birds are singing, the fans are cheering, and professional athletes are getting paid exorbitant amounts of money, at left on most teams. It's opening day in America. That ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: So last week, Major League Baseball opened with two teams playing in Japan. Last night, Major League Baseball opened in Baltimore. But today was the real deal. President Bush showed up in Saint Louis to throw the first pitch before the game between the Cardinals and the Brewers, a prerogative of presidents. Not a bad effort either. Fastball pretty close to -- I was taking to see how he did -- fastball pretty close to the strike zone, I'm told. The vice president was in on the action as well. He appeared in Cincinnati, where opening days in the past have usually been held. And he threw out first pitch before a game between the Reds and the Cubs, all of which brings us to our next guest, Michael Lewis, who wrote a best- selling book called "Moneyball" that came out last year just as the baseball season was opening. In his spook, Mr. Lewis spent a lot of time breaking down the success of the Oakland A's in general and the team's general and the team's general manager, Billy Beane, in particular. The A's became more famous than they already were for using statistics to help bring them success. Yes, they lost to the Red Sox last fall in the American League divisional series. But as every team executive in the game will tell you, the past is past. What counts is today. Welcome. Thanks for being with us.
MICHAEL LEWIS, AUTHOR, "MONEYBALL": Thanks for having me.
COOPER: The paperback just came out today, which is why you're out talking about this.
LEWIS: Right, why I have left my home.
COOPER: Why you have left your home. We appreciate the fact you have left your home. What did the Oakland A's do that was so different?
LEWIS: What they did was grab off the shelf sort of research that had been done about the valuation of baseball players and baseball strategies.
COOPER: And they basically said it was bunk.
LEWIS: That had been done outside the game by outsiders over a period of a couple of decades. And they internalized it, took it seriously and developed their own kind of R&D department to rethink the game. They were in this horrible position of having very little money to spend on baseball players compared to the teams they were going up against and they had to find a different way of going about it or they couldn't compete.
COOPER: And so they picked out what you describe as some the oddball players, players who would be passed over for what reason?
LEWIS: All sorts of reasons, right up to the way they looked. But when I walked into that clubhouse the first time, I remember coming out and turning to the assistant G.M., Paul DePodesta, who is now the G.M. of the Dodgers, and saying, your guys -- they don't look right. They're a little chubby, a little short. And he said, what you have to understand is that for a player to become a member of the Oakland A's, he has to be defective in some way, because if he's not defective, at least on the surface...
COOPER: Someone else will get him.
LEWIS: Well, the market will value him properly and we can't afford him, that we have to build our team out of people who, on the surface, have got something wrong with them, but, underneath, have some hidden value.
COOPER: What were the hidden values?
(CROSSTALK)
LEWIS: Well, take the example of pitchers, because the pitchers, there is an awful lot of noise made about them -- and rightly so -- about the pitchers they've accumulated. They've accumulated them in a very specific way. They decided a few years ago that -- they made a study and they found that drafting high school pitchers was a mugs game, there it much smarter as an investment philosophy to draft college -- they were much more likely work out, college pitchers of a certain -- who fit a certain statistical profile, which wasn't -- this is different from what most people think -- how hard they threw. There is an obsession made about how pitchers throw.
COOPER: Right.
LEWIS: And, instead, they looked at sort of how they performed. They looked at a lot of things, strikeout-to-walk ratio, various things, and drafted them in bulk, a certain kind of pitcher. And, as a result, they're rich throughout the organization in pitching because in fact this was a good way to go about it.
COOPER: So when this book came out, we were talking about this before, you said it sort of ignited this whole discussion about this. Some people hated the book and thought that -- or they didn't like not the book itself, but the ideas expressed in it, the whole philosophy.
LEWIS: I'm sure somebody hated the book.
(LAUGHTER)
LEWIS: But it was interesting is that the only -- the book was seized upon by other professional sports and especially on Wall Street, because Wall Street people saw this for what it was, which was Wall Street kind of thinking. They were looking at baseball players as a market and trying to find undervalued players and overvalued players that they would then sell.
COOPER: Because you described Billy Beane almost in
(CROSSTALK)
LEWIS: As a Wall Street trader.
COOPER: As a Wall Streeter.
LEWIS: That's right. And so Wall Street saw this and said, this is exactly what we do. And that's in fact what the Oakland A's front office would tell you, is that we're bringing a kind of Wall Street approach to the game.
COOPER: And that Wall Street approach is, you say now it's spreading throughout the game.
LEWIS: It is spreading, because organizations that are in crisis or that get new owners see that this is a very smart way to run your business. And so the Toronto Blue Jays, the Boston Red Sox and now the Los Angeles Dodgers have all hired either Billy Beane disciples or people who worked right with him. But inside the game, it created a very hostile response. I didn't think of it as a controversial story. I thought of it as kind of an inspirational tale, these underdogs.But it was controversial inside the game, because it was saying, in so many words, that the way you're doing your business isn't so bright. And if you're an owner of one of these teams who is spending $100 million to watch your team lose from year to year, what do you're doing? What do you -- do you have any way of rationally -- of evaluating the people who build your baseball team?
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: George Steinbrenner is not going to read this and say to himself, you know what, I've been going about this all wrong.
LEWIS: No, because he can afford to make as many mistakes as he wants. He could make every mistake in the world and still have the best baseball team.
COOPER: Right.
LEWIS: Because he got to spend $200 million on baseball players. That's now almost five times what the Oakland A's are spending. And but the reason that he can -- it is a luxury he has because his revenues are so much greater than the other teams. But he can go out and make some huge mistake by buying a player for a huge sum of money who doesn't work out. And if he doesn't work out, he just throws him on the scrap heap and goes and gets another one. So the Yankees don't think about this so much. But a lot of other teams do. And
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: And a lot of other ones are thinking about this.
(CROSSTALK)
LEWIS: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. And the effect is to bring a different kind of player into the game in a way because it -- if you are sort of subverting the prejudices of the market as it is to find other kinds of players, it gives all sorts of people who might not have an opportunity an opportunity.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Fascinating. The book is "Moneyball." Michael Lewis, thank you.
LEWIS: Thanks for having me.
COOPER: All right. Well, still ahead on NEWSNIGHT, we're going check in on our top story and take a look at what we'll have tomorrow. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Before we go, a quick recap of our top story.In Iraq, firefights erupted in the Sunni city of Fallujah, as U.S. Marines move to seal off the city in response to the killing and mutilation of four American security guards there last week and in the Shia sections of Baghdad, as an arrest warrant was sworn out against a militant cleric.Tomorrow on NEWSNIGHT, the terrible story of Rwanda. Ten years go this month, almost one million people murdered as the world stood by and watched. How did it happen? How could it happen? Could it happen again? That is tomorrow night, 10:00 p.m. Eastern.Thanks very much for joining us. See you tomorrow.
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Aired April 5, 2004 - 22:00 ET
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ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening again, everyone. I'm Anderson Cooper. Aaron Brown is off tonight.The news once again from Iraq is both disturbing and, if you agree with the critics of the American presence there, ominous. For months now, American military planners have been concerned about what they see as the worst of two worlds, fighting against the minority Sunnis and their bastion in Fallujah and, at the same time, fighting the more radical Shias, especially in their stronghold called Sadr City in the heart of the capital.Both of those events have now happened and though American soldiers and their Iraqi counterparts are striking back, the outcome is far from certain. It was a busy deadly weekend in Iraq and the events there will play a large part in our reporting tonight.The whip starts off first stop Baghdad and CNN's Walter Rodgers, Walt a headline.
WALTER RODGERS, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, the Americans got a glimpse of their worst nightmare in Iraq, an armed Shiite revolt against the occupation over the weekend. It had to be more than a little sobering for the folks in Washington -- Anderson.
COOPER: Walt, back to you shortly.On to the Pentagon and a number of questions, our Chief Pentagon Correspondent Jamie McIntyre has the watch tonight, Jamie a headline from you.
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Anderson, after months of insisting that the U.S. didn't need additional troops in Iraq the top U.S. commander has asked his planners to draw up options for more troops just in case. Admission of a miscalculation or is it just, as one Pentagon official said, prudent planning for an option that will probably never be exercised?
COOPER: We shall see.Next to the politics of war in an election year, John King our Senior White House Correspondent on the road tonight in New Orleans with Vice President Cheney, John a headline
.JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, both the president and the vice president today said the United States will not be driven from Iraq by terrorists and thugs, as they put it, but the president's Democratic opponents said Mr. Bush has failed the diplomatic test. Another leading Democrat calling Iraq today Mr. Bush's Vietnam -- Anderson.
COOPER: Finally to Boston, not closure in the priestly sex abuse scandal but a milestone just the same. CNN's Dan Lothian with the story for us, Dan a headline.
DAN LOTHIAN, CNN BOSTON BUREAU CHIEF: Well, Anderson, it is yet another agreement in the clergy's sexual abuse scandal. Four alleged victims who filed lawsuits of one but they still want their case to go to criminal court -- Anderson.
COOPER: Back to all of you in a moment.Also on the program tonight, the tragic story of a young Tampa schoolteacher and the hit-and-run accident.Also the young man the U.S. military is doing its best to arrest, Sheikh al-Sadr, and why so many Iraqis are answering his call for violence. Retired General Wesley Clark is here with his take on the situation.And on the other side of the world, baseball by the numbers. Listen up Mr. Steinbrenner. How to get the most of your money. Author Michael Lewis joins us a bit later, all that to come in the hour ahead.We begin tonight with the turmoil in Iraq and the possibility, many would say the growing possibility, of more to come. Even before the events of the weekend, the events of today, the situation was incendiary. Tonight, it is explosive and complicated and that much more costly in lives, not just American lives either.It may also be the beginning of a more overt, more violent phase of the struggle for who controls Iraq when power is put back into Iraqi hands and at the center of that jockeying for power tonight sits a Shiite cleric who is now a wanted man.Here again, CNN's Walter Rodgers.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RODGERS (voice-over): These Iraqis are followers of the fiery Muslim Sheikh Moqtada al-Sadr, the man the United States says is behind an armed Shiite revolt against coalition forces over the weekend.In Baghdad alone, Sadr's outlawed militia killed eight American soldiers Sunday. The United States is now pressing an outstanding arrest warrant for their leader.
BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT, COALITION SPOKESMAN: He is free to surrender. He is free to walk into any police station. He will be treated the same way every other alleged criminal in the Iraqi justice system is treated.
RODGERS: Branded an outlaw by the United States, Sadr is violently anti-American and pro-Iranian. He's promised an intifada against the occupation here. Most of his victims so far, however, are Iraqis, killed in violence spawned by his militia filling local morgues.Sunday's violence spilled into Monday in violence ridden Shiite neighborhoods that fired at helicopters which in turn fired back sending smoke columns above Baghdad. Because this revolt was spawned by radical Shiites who have heretofore been quiet, a general worried allowed.BRIG.
GEN. MARTIN DEMPSEY, CMDR. 1ST ARMORED DIVISION: If it gains some kind of popular sympathy that eventually becomes popular support, then we have a challenge on our hands.
RODGERS: In Fallujah, the epicenter of violence with Sunni Muslims, U.S. Marines reestablished control hunting those who ambushed and killed four American civilians a week ago this in an ongoing operation.
(END VIDEOTAPE)R
ODGERS: All this violence, first Sunni and then Shiite could be an aberration. If not, however, and if the radical Shias and Sunnis were to join forces the United States could find itself in an extremely uncomfortable position here -- Anderson.
COOPER: Walter, this arrest warrant was apparently issued a while back, according to the U.S., but we really had not heard anything about it until today. Why today all of a sudden has this been announced?
RODGERS: Because of the violence over the weekend and that violence was, according to the coalition, particularly the United States, sparked and ignited by Moqtada al-Sadr's al-Mahdi Army. Now that's an illegal militia but they were out on the street doing Sadr's bidding. The United States is more than a little angry. At least eight Americans were killed Sunday. The Americans want this man shut down. The question is do they have the troops or the courage to do it? The consequences could be enormous -- Anderson.
COOPER: Explosive indeed. Walter Rodgers thanks.Long before the first soldier landed in the region the number of troops needed to do the job was a bone of contention both inside the military and out. Now, CNN has learned that after insisting for months that no additional forces are needed, the top American commander is asking for options just in case.With that, here's CNN's Jamie McIntyre.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MCINTYRE (voice-over): A weekend of violent demonstrations by Iraqi Shiites so concerned U.S. Central Commander General John Abizaid sources say he ordered up options for a quick infusion of additional U.S. troops if needed. A senior Pentagon official called it prudent planning for a worst case scenario in the unanticipated event violence gets out of control but as of now U.S. commanders believe there are adequate forces on the ground and so far there is no request for additional troops.Because the U.S. is in the middle of a massive troop rotation it actually has a temporary spike in the number of troops in Iraq from 120,000 at the beginning of the year to roughly 134,000 today. Commanders routinely reposition troops within Iraq and sources say shifting troops already in the country to trouble spots is far more likely than deploying additional troops.Still, the contingency planning itself shows how concerned the Pentagon is about the problem in Baghdad and farther south for up to now the Iraqi Shiite majority has been mostly cooperating with the U.S.-led occupation force.Unlike in Fallujah, a Sunni stronghold where the U.S. is convinced a forceful crackdown by U.S. Marines will break the anti- American resistance, neutralizing the fire brand Muslin cleric who sparked this weekend's violence requires more finesse.The U.S. wants to arrest Moqtada al-Sadr without inflaming Shiite passions or making him a martyr. The U.S. insists al-Sadr is a minor cleric on a power grab whose outlawed militia numbers less than 3,000.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCINTYRE: Today, a very senior military official vowed that al- Sadr will be captured or killed -- captured, rather, sooner rather than later and he also vowed that they would disband and disarm his private army but the U.S. military is biding its time. It's believed that al-Sadr is hiding in a mosque or religious area and the last thing the U.S. wants to do is be seen as desecrating a Shiite religious site and, therefore, inciting a backlash from the Shiite community -- Anderson.
COOPER: So, what would the strategy be then wait until he travels somewhere, wait until -- I mean is there a sense that there is great human intelligence on the ground that the U.S. has a sense of where this man is at all times?
MCINTYRE: Well, the statement that I heard from officials today is we're not in a big hurry that we feel like we have to get him tomorrow or the next day but we will get him and they'll be watching for an opportunity, watching for a time when they can minimize the impact and they're also putting some pressure on the Iraqis to see if they can get them to put some pressure on him and even perhaps carry out the arrest.
COOPER: All right, Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon, thanks Jamie. On now to the president, growing pressure on the White House to rethink the time table for the political handover in Iraq and shrinking approval for Mr. Bush's handling of the situation this according to some new polling done after the attack in Fallujah but before the uprising this weekend.For the latest on that side of things we turn once again to CNN's John King traveling with the vice president in New Orleans. Good evening, John.KING: Good evening to you, Anderson.And several reminders today of the political wildcard that the Iraqi situation is in this presidential campaign year. Both the president and the vice president on the road today, Mr. Bush in North Carolina then in Missouri, the vice president traveling to Ohio, then ending up in Louisiana tonight, both trying to focus on their campaign priorities but both also having to deal with this violent situation in Iraq.The president himself made clear that he supports the arrest warrant for that Shiite cleric. The president also, though, adamant in saying that the United States will stick to its deadline and will transfer sovereignty to a new Iraqi government on June 30th.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We will stay the course. We will do what is right. We will make sure that a free Iraq emerges not only for our own security but for the sake of free people's everywhere. A free Iraq will change the Middle East. A free Iraq will make the world more peaceful. A free Iraq will make America more secure. We will not be shaken by thugs and terrorists.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: An identical message from Vice President Cheney tonight here in New Orleans at a fund-raising speech. He said very much the same thing that the thugs and terrorists are trying to drive the United States out. Mr. Cheney vowing that would not happen.Back in Washington, though, and around the country, Democratic criticism of the president intensifying. His Democratic opponent John Kerry saying Mr. Bush has failed the diplomatic test and that he should immediately explain to the American people just how he plans to turn over sovereignty to the Iraqis less than three months from now. And Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts today delivering a blistering speech in which he called Iraq Mr. Bush's Vietnam. And, Anderson, of course the president could face the very difficult choice if General Abizaid decides he does want more troops. Mr. Bush had hoped to bring the troop levels down this election year but he, of course, is on record many times saying that if the commanders want more troops they will get them -- Anderson.
COOPER: John, did you get the sense that anyone at the White House was surprised that the information about General Abizaid sort of floating out these options, looking into the options of perhaps getting more troops was it a surprise that that information came out today?
KING: It is never a surprise when information leaks. It is perhaps viewed as unfortunate politically because of the timing of these things. It is certainly an issue that they would rather not have in the campaign.There are already all those other questions. Why is there so much violence? Why such anti-American sentiment? There's still no plan at all for who the United States will hand over sovereignty to, so this is yet another political wildcard, a major question that could, we should emphasize could, be looming over the president but they're never surprised when there are leaks. They may not like them but they're not surprised -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right, John King thanks very much.There's a lot to sort out here and joining us in that effort tonight, General Wesley Clark, who as you know was one of the contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination. Among the issues facing the administration, the possibility at least of more American troops on the ground and the possibility as well, the very last thing Americans want to hear in Iraq, civil war. General Clark thanks very much for being with us.
GEN. WESLEY CLARK (RET.), FORMER NATO SUPREME ALLIED COMMANDER: Good to be with you, Anderson. Remember, I was also one of your military analysts here.
COOPER: Yes, of course. Yes, I well remember. Do you -- is it at the point of possibility? I mean that word civil war is one we haven't heard much talked about the last couple of weeks.
CLARK: It's always been a risk in Iraq that this could happen and there were always those who crowed you see, see there's no civil war, but it was always too soon.
COOPER: Is the risk greater tonight?
CLARK: Yes. The risk is building because what the U.S. presence there has done is it's released fractionating forces inside Iraq that Saddam Hussein kept suppressed. Now, we're at a really critical juncture here. What we need is a strong military -- set of military tactics to deal with the insurgents in Fallujah and the Sunnis and, at the same time, we need enough forces there to handle civil strife with the Shia.
COOPER: So, is a military solution possible?
CLARK: No.
COOPER: I mean is this something that can be solved through the military?
CLARK: No, but you can lose it militarily. You can't win it militarily but you could lose it so...
COOPER: What exactly does that mean?CLARK: If John Abizaid needs more troops, then I would hope the administration would supply them and promptly as many as he needs. In other words, you don't want to be run out, we don't want to be run out of Fallujah and we don't want to have another situation where there's chaos in the streets of Najaf or in Baghdad where we don't have enough forces to control that and handle it.But, on the other hand, the military cannot succeed in quelling this. Ultimately, it requires a political solution, which means a political strategy, which means first coming to terms with the fact that the Shia are the majority in Iraq. Ultimately they will be the most powerful force in shaping the future of the country.The distribution of power among the factions in the Shia group has not been resolved. There's Iranian influence there. There are those who are more radical, those who are more moderate. We need to work with all of them, not with Chalabi and that's the problem.
COOPER: So by acknowledging, as you say, the Shia predominance in Iraq, are you basically indicating a desire to bolster say al- Sistani, other clerics other than Sadr because there is this internal battle going on among these Shiite clerics and there are some who say al-Sadr is basically making a move to sort of bolster his own position internally?
CLARK: Right. I think we need to be doing more with Sistani and what we need to do is get the conflict between them moved to a political level rather than resolved by force of arms. But to do that requires dealing with all of the contending parties, not showing our hands of favoritism too soon, leaving this up to the Iraqi people themselves to decide within certain broad guidelines.In other words, it means you have to approach it by understanding that you cannot win this with a military strategy. There's no magic military strategy to keep people off the streets. You have to take the steam out of it by dealing with it politically.
COOPER: What's your take on -- the Marines in the last weeks and months have talked a lot about sort of their approach to what's going to happen and Fallujah I guess is going to be a case study in this. Now we're told they have sealed off the city. They're on the outskirts. They're not allowing people in and out. There's a curfew. Can that be successful? I mean is the way they plan on going about it do you think a better way than was being gone after before?
CLARK: It's a really tough thing to call from a distance. You really have to be there and look at each of the incidents. You have to talk with the people on the ground and I would hope that the commanders there are doing that. At the outset when we went into Fallujah and we were there with I think it was the 3rd Armored Cav originally, we took some resistance. We took some casualties and the idea was well let's train the Iraqi police and let them handle it because we're being provocative just by being there.The Marines learned from that. They thought they would extend this but we cannot allow tactically the situation to occur that occurred in Fallujah where basically unarmored vehicles are ambushed and it's not safe for Americans to go in there. That's just -- it's against the law. It's murder essentially what happened and that can't be tolerated.So, if the authorities there cannot deliver the killers themselves, then it warrants an intrusive U.S. presence but here's the point to underscore, that's only tactics. That won't win. That will keep us from being run out but to win we have to have a political strategy. The difficulty with the administration is that they have not been able to get past their support of Ahmed Chalabi, their favorite.
COOPER: They're too invested in him you're saying?
CLARK: Right. To be able to create a broader political strategy we simply have to do this to be successful.COOPER: And very briefly the June 30 deadline that has to stay, has to remain?
CLARK: I think that has to stay but what exactly it means is less clear now. I hope that it will mean right now that we'll take heed to this and try to bring all of the Shia factions together and let them work through peaceful means to resolve their quarrels.
COOPER: All right. General Wesley Clark thanks very much, always good to see you.
CLARK: Thank you, Anderson.Well, coming up on NEWSNIGHT, another chapter in the Boston clergy abuse case as four defendants settle out of court for a significant amount.Also four children, all siblings, all under the age of 14, and all the victims of a hit-and-run. From New York this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: How much is a childhood worth? Is there any amount of money that can make up for years of abuse and betrayal? Or is any settlement, no matter how large, just a down payment on a debt the Catholic Church in Boston will never finally pay off?Today, four more young men agreed to drop their civil cases against the archdiocese. In return they received undisclosed cash settlements, money that will never make them whole but at least acknowledges their pain, pain allegedly caused by a priest that one of the lawyers called a human wrecking ball.Dan Lothian has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LOTHIAN (voice-over): One more chapter closes in the Boston clergy sex scandal, the archdiocese agreeing to settle four civil cases involving former priest Paul Shanley for an undisclosed but "significant amount.
"ERIC MACLEISH, PLAINTIFF'S ATTORNEY: This is a milestone, I think, that has been reached today in this settlement, which will provide much needed assistance for people who badly need it.
LOTHIAN: Gregory Ford and Paul Busa are two of the four alleged victims who have gone public accusing Father Shanley of raping them at a suburban Boston church in the 1980s when they were young boys. Pleased with the agreement but said to still be traumatized, Ford spoke through his sister.
KATHRYN FORD, GREGORY'S SISTER: I would like to move forward with my life in a quiet manner.
LOTHIAN: The archdiocese is trying to move forward too.
FATHER CHRIS COYNE, ARCHDIOCESE OF BOSTON: We're glad that we were able to come to a settlement with the families but we also are very much still saddened by what happened and recognize that what happened was a tragedy.
LOTHIAN: Ford and the three others opted out of last year's landmark settlement with the Boston Archdiocese involving more than 550 victims, pursuing instead individual lawsuits. The latest agreement came in part, say attorneys, because of compelling evidence they were ready to present in court, such as documents and witness interviews.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Could you, in fact, identify the two voices you heard in the bathroom on those occasions?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
LOTHIAN: Allegations against Shanley were exposed about two years ago. After more than 70,000 documents were uncovered the priest abuse scandal exploded eventually bringing down Boston Cardinal Bernard Law. Shanley was ultimately arrested and charged with multiple counts of child rape. The criminal case continues despite the settlement agreement.
MACLEISH: Our office, as well as the victims, will continue to do anything we can to secure Father Shanley's position in a jail cell for the rest of his natural life.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LOTHIAN: Shanley is currently free on $300,000 bail staying at an undisclosed location in the state. His criminal trial is expected to begin in October. Now, CNN attempted to reach his attorney today for a comment but he did not return our calls -- Anderson.
COOPER: So, the trial is -- for Shanley in October is it one case, how many cases, I mean how many charges does he face do we know?
LOTHIAN: Right. He faces multiple charges. Ten of the counts have to do with child rape but he's charged in four specific rape charges against these alleged victims. Three of those victims are some of the ones who were in this, involved in this settlement today.
COOPER: So, even though they were involved in this separate settlement they will still take part in the criminal proceedings?
LOTHIAN: That is correct. They did win this settlement but they still plan to take part in the criminal proceedings, their attorneys saying that they will be there and helping the prosecution on the witness stand.
COOPER: All right. Dan Lothian thanks very much from Boston tonight.What actually happened five days ago in the gathering dusk of a Florida evening is still unclear. Were there two cars involved or only one? Did someone driving by in a van witness what happened and just keep on going? The aftermath sadly was very clear. Four children, brothers and sisters, were hit while crossing a Tampa street by a driver or drivers who then drove away, drove away leaving two children dead and a community wondering how this could happen. Today there were some answers, not all the answers, but at least some.Susan Candiotti reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JENNIFER PORTER, DRIVER: I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Five days after a fatal hit-and-run, Jennifer Porter sat before cameras, her eyes fixed on a brief written statement and apologized to the victims' mother.
PORTER: I wish there was more that I could say to ease your pain. I know there is nothing I can do to bring your two precious sons back, Bryant and Deronte (ph).
CANDIOTTI: As her family watched, Porter and her attorney chose their words carefully. Neither technically acknowledged she was the driver of a car that struck and killed two young brothers who were crossing a Tampa street last Wednesday. Neither would discuss what happened or why the 28-year-old grade school dance teacher left the scene without stopping.
BARRY COHEN, PORTER'S ATTORNEY: No one knows how he or she will react in the face of what Jennifer was faced with, frightened beyond imagination.
CANDIOTTI: At a weekend vigil, victims Bryant Wilkins, 13, and his 3-year-old brother Deronte were remembered. Their 8-year-old sister, who has spoken with police and 2-year-old brother survived their injuries. Police say they're still looking for a van with possible witnesses. They say another car might also be involved in the hit-and-run.Porter's family contacted the lawyer two days after the accident and he called police. Before Porter came forward, the victims' mother spoke publicly.
MALISSA WILKINS, VICTIMS' MOTHER: Whoever hit my baby I know you're probably scared and I hold no hatred toward nobody.
CANDIOTTI (on camera): Police have not yet made any arrests. They say they're still collecting evidence from Porter's seized car and are interviewing witnesses. Porter's attorney says she is cooperating with police but won't explain how. For now he's not allowing her to speak with authorities because, as he puts it, she's dealing with a lot of tough issues.Susan Candiotti, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, some call him the son of Saddam. Some call him an outlaw. The U.S. military calls him wanted. Straight ahead a look at Sheikh al-Sadr.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, as we said, Iraq's provisional governing authority has issued an arrest warrant for the Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. It was a warrant issued sometime ago but only put into genuine effect after the bloody weekend of violence. He is a man, it seems, determined to take power and determined not to share it with any other Shiite leaders. Some background now from CNN's Jim Clancy.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Moqtada al-Sadr was all but unknown outside Iraq when the U.S.-led coalition invaded a year ago. The 31-year-old Shia leader is the son of a respected cleric, killed under the rule of Saddam Hussein.Some say in a way he is also a son of Saddam for Moqtada al-Sadr has undeniably inherited the ability to parlay his political savvy and ruthlessness into power. An outlaw is how U.S. Civilian Administrator Paul Bremer describes al-Sadr. It's an opinion not formed yesterday. A year ago, the U.S. brought Abdel-Majid al-Khoei to Najaf. An Iraqi exile, al-Khoei was pro-Western, anti-Saddam and he had impressive Shia credentials. He also had CIA money to pay city salaries. With U.S. and British support, he seemed destined to play a major role in a new Iraq. But in time measured only in days, Abdel-Majid al-Khoei was dead. (on camera): All accounts say the pro-Western al-Khoei was hacked to death with knives after being chased by a mob from inside the Imam Ali mosque in Najaf. Many say it was an internal power struggle among Iraq's Shia Muslims, pointing a finger at Muqtada al- Sadr and his militant supporters. Sadr vehemently denies it. But one year later, arrest warrants are pointing in that same direction.
DAN SENOR, COALITION PROVISIONAL AUTHORITY: An Iraqi judge issued an arrest warrant for Muqtada al-Sadr. And that is based on evidence that connects Muqtada al-Sadr to the brutal murder of Mr. al- Khoei.
CLANCY (voice-over): The weekend clashes in four Iraqi cities coincided with mounting concern after the arrest of one of al-Sadr's key aides. Rumors that he also would be charged had certainly reached Muqtada al-Sadr himself. In the streets of Sadr City on Monday, after a night of clashes, Sadr supporters stressed the urgency of the situation. Wearing a hood and clutching a hand grenade, one said they would make Iraq the Americans' graveyard. "We have seven American prisoners and we'll trade them for our prisoners," he declared, a claim the U.S. military flatly denied. Muqtada al-Sadr has retreated to his mosque in Kufa, surrounded by his followers and not within easy reach of Iraqi police. But the militant young cleric can also count on his network of supporters across Iraq, who chant "long, long, long live Sadr." Charitable groups he inherited from his father have distributed aid to the needy. He's been against the occupation from the start. He has challenged its authority, setting up his own courts and his own prisons. Now he has challenged it with guns on the streets.
BRIG. GEN. MARK HERTLING, U.S. ARMY: He's trying to intimidate people, as the political process continues on.
CLANCY: Some argue al-Sadr is inpatient, that he misjudged the coalition badly. But the real question yet to be answered is whether Muqtada al-Sadr will emerge from it all stronger or weaker. Jim Clancy, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: And Joining us now is Rod Nordland, Baghdad bureau chief for "Newsweek" and safe to say a very busy man. We're pleased he had a spare moment for us. Rod, the U.S. military points out al-Sadr has been a minor figure in Iraq. Does he still appear like a minor figure there tonight?
ROD NORDLAND, BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF, "NEWSWEEK": Well, I think he's getting a big boost by being the center of attention. And it may just well be that he ends up some sort of martyr here and much more powerful than we ever thought he would be. One of the reasons -- they have had this arrest warrant for him apparently for months. And one of the reasons they probably have hesitated to execute it is because they wanted to avoid just that, making him a much bigger figure than he really is.
COOPER: The U.S. went to great pains to point out that it was an Iraqi judge who actually issued this arrest warrant, but does that really play in Baghdad right now, that angle to it? I would imagine it is hard to see this as anything but the U.S. going after this cleric.
NORDLAND: Well, sure. The entire government is appointed by the United States right now, including the judges, either directly or indirectly. And that point is not lost on anybody. Plus, the only party that has the force necessary to actually execute an arrest warrant is the United States. I can't imagine that the Iraqi police will do it. There is even some accounts of Iraqi police in Najaf actually changing sides and joining Muqtada al-Sadr's people.
COOPER: Because I guess some of these Iraqi police or a lot of them were originally recruited from some of these militias. They were the natural go-to people to fill the police ranks.
NORDLAND: In some cases. I think in most cases, though, they have gone outside of that. They've also been recruited from former policemen and just independently as well.
COOPER: How do the other Shia clerics -- what is the next step for them? How do they respond to this? Because there are internal power struggles going on within the Shia movement, among these clerics. Do they then either -- I guess they're forced to either decide between Sadr and the U.S.
NORDLAND: Well, the prominent clerics who form the house -- and especially Ayatollah Sistani, have been fairly moderate all along. And, at the same time, Muqtada al-Sadr has not -- has never criticized them. He looks to them as his religious guidance as well. Now what has happened, and it is very worrisome, is that Sistani issued a statement basically criticizing the Americans and their action in regard to Muqtada al-Sadr and asking people to support him. He also calls for calm. And it is a fairly -- like most of his statements, it's fairly moderate. But it is very worrisome if people interpret that as a signal that they should support Muqtada al-Sadr. Instead of the few thousand people he's been able to command before, he may well get massive numbers in the streets.
COOPER: And I read a statement that Sadr made I guess through others in which he was calling for anything but calm, not even calling for demonstrations. He was calling -- I believe the word he used was terrorize. He suggested his followers terrorize the U.S. and other allied forces.
NORDLAND: That's right. And that was in response to the shutting down of his newspaper and the arrest of his aides. And the temperature has been ratcheting up. Even more worrisome is his support for the people in Fallujah who are Sunni Arabs and some indications that they're throwing their support toward him. And there is a very serious risk here of the radical Sunnis and the radical Shias throwing their lot in together.
COOPER: Of the military people you talk to on the ground in Iraq, do they seem confident that there a military solution to any of this?
NORDLAND: Well, there is military solution to arresting Muqtada al-Sadr. But it could be very messy. And that could just inflame the situation even farther. There is a military solution to Fallujah. They can go in and do anything they want to in Fallujah, but, again, it is going to be at quite a cost. And the real risk now is that these two very separate issues and conflicts risk kind of blowing things up and bringing very two different elements in against the United States for the first time.
COOPER: Rod Nordland, appreciate you joining us on the program tonight. Thank you very much. Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, hot dogs, peanuts and beer. Mmm, beer. It can only mean one thing, opening day in America. We'll talk to author Michael Lewis just ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, some other stories now making news around the world. The U.N.'s top nuclear inspector is in Iran with some tough words for the Islamic republic. Mohamed ElBaradei was asked why the visit given Iran's cooperation. "I think," he replied, "the question does not necessarily reflect the facts." Mr. ElBaradei says Iran needs to do more. He'll make the case to the Iranian leadership in person tomorrow. Flash flooding killed at least 21 people today in a town on Mexico's northern border. It happened just south of Eagle Pass in Texas. Another five dozen people have been reported missing.And in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, a shoot-out between security forces and a pair of suspected Islamic militants. According to authorities, it began when police tried to stop a car with stolen plates. The men inside opened fire. Police gave chase, shooting out the tires, killing one suspect and finally wounding the other. Well, tonight's "Moneyline Roundup" begins with the fallout from a giant bank merger. Bank of America says, as a result of merging with Fleet bank, it will shed 12,500 jobs. The cuts will be spread out over the next two years and about a third will come from attrition. New numbers tonight, wholesale prices went up slightly in February one-tenth percent. This is better than expected and a sign that inflation won't be a concern for some time yet. This also gave markets a shot in the arm, sending the Dow and the S&P up a nice chunk of change for the day. And coming up ahead on NEWSNIGHT, not guilty by reason of insanity, how one Texas woman is getting away with killing two of her children. Around the world, this is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, there was no question about what happened. On Mother's Day last year, Deanna Laney smashed rocks into the heads of her three young children. The two older boys, 6 and 8, died. And the youngest, only 2 years old, is maimed for the rest of his life. The only question was why. Why did she do it? Yesterday, a jury concluded it was a question that didn't have an answer that the rest of us could understand. Eric Philips has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We the jury find unanimously and by a preponderance of the evidence the defendant Deanna Laney not guilty by reason of insanity.
ERIC PHILIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): An emotional Deanna Laney learned she would not be going to prison for killing two of her children. She was found not guilty by reason of insanity.
DEANNA LANEY, ACQUITTED BY REASON OF INSANITY: I feel like that I obeyed god.
PHILIPS: Laney said in this videotaped deposition that god told her to kill her children. Mental health experts say she was suffering from severe delusions.
DR. PARK DIETZ, PSYCHIATRIST: She believed this was a trial by god and that after killing the children, they would be resurrected. LANEY: That's what I was told to do and that's what I had to do.
PHILIPS: Prosecutors argued that Laney was not insane, that she acted normal in the hours before bashing her son's head with rocks, the stonings killed two of the boys, 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke and permanently injured their 2-year-old brother Aaron.
MATT BINGHAM, SMITH COUNTY DA: That day started out like any other day in the life of the Laney family with her manifesting zero, none outward signs of trouble to anyone.
BUCK FILES, LANEY'S ATTORNEY: You cannot understand what is going through her mind and see how it looks to her because of this psychotic illness. PHILIPS: The jury agreed that Laney was insane at the time of the violent killings. She will be held at a maximum security state hospital until doctors say she is well enough to be released. Eric Philips, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: A few more items now from around the country, starting in Dallas with an update on Ahmed and Mohamed Ibrahim. They're the Egyptian boys who were joined at the head when they were born. Surgery last fall separated them. And today, we learned they left the hospital a few days ago. Remarkable pictures, these. They still have several operations ahead of them. But, for the first time ever, they'll be living in a home away from the hospital with their family. A new survey of customer satisfaction is good news for budget airlines. Three of the top four performing carriers last year were of the low-fare variety. JetBlue came in first. Alaska and Southwest took the silver and bronze. America West rounded out the field. And "The L.A. Times" came out on tops in the Pulitzer Prizes, winning five. That is the second most ever won by a paper, exceeded only by "The New York Times," which won seven in the aftermath of 9/11. Still ahead tonight on NEWSNIGHT, ah, that time of the year again, that time when the birds are singing, the fans are cheering, and professional athletes are getting paid exorbitant amounts of money, at left on most teams. It's opening day in America. That ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: So last week, Major League Baseball opened with two teams playing in Japan. Last night, Major League Baseball opened in Baltimore. But today was the real deal. President Bush showed up in Saint Louis to throw the first pitch before the game between the Cardinals and the Brewers, a prerogative of presidents. Not a bad effort either. Fastball pretty close to -- I was taking to see how he did -- fastball pretty close to the strike zone, I'm told. The vice president was in on the action as well. He appeared in Cincinnati, where opening days in the past have usually been held. And he threw out first pitch before a game between the Reds and the Cubs, all of which brings us to our next guest, Michael Lewis, who wrote a best- selling book called "Moneyball" that came out last year just as the baseball season was opening. In his spook, Mr. Lewis spent a lot of time breaking down the success of the Oakland A's in general and the team's general and the team's general manager, Billy Beane, in particular. The A's became more famous than they already were for using statistics to help bring them success. Yes, they lost to the Red Sox last fall in the American League divisional series. But as every team executive in the game will tell you, the past is past. What counts is today. Welcome. Thanks for being with us.
MICHAEL LEWIS, AUTHOR, "MONEYBALL": Thanks for having me.
COOPER: The paperback just came out today, which is why you're out talking about this.
LEWIS: Right, why I have left my home.
COOPER: Why you have left your home. We appreciate the fact you have left your home. What did the Oakland A's do that was so different?
LEWIS: What they did was grab off the shelf sort of research that had been done about the valuation of baseball players and baseball strategies.
COOPER: And they basically said it was bunk.
LEWIS: That had been done outside the game by outsiders over a period of a couple of decades. And they internalized it, took it seriously and developed their own kind of R&D department to rethink the game. They were in this horrible position of having very little money to spend on baseball players compared to the teams they were going up against and they had to find a different way of going about it or they couldn't compete.
COOPER: And so they picked out what you describe as some the oddball players, players who would be passed over for what reason?
LEWIS: All sorts of reasons, right up to the way they looked. But when I walked into that clubhouse the first time, I remember coming out and turning to the assistant G.M., Paul DePodesta, who is now the G.M. of the Dodgers, and saying, your guys -- they don't look right. They're a little chubby, a little short. And he said, what you have to understand is that for a player to become a member of the Oakland A's, he has to be defective in some way, because if he's not defective, at least on the surface...
COOPER: Someone else will get him.
LEWIS: Well, the market will value him properly and we can't afford him, that we have to build our team out of people who, on the surface, have got something wrong with them, but, underneath, have some hidden value.
COOPER: What were the hidden values?
(CROSSTALK)
LEWIS: Well, take the example of pitchers, because the pitchers, there is an awful lot of noise made about them -- and rightly so -- about the pitchers they've accumulated. They've accumulated them in a very specific way. They decided a few years ago that -- they made a study and they found that drafting high school pitchers was a mugs game, there it much smarter as an investment philosophy to draft college -- they were much more likely work out, college pitchers of a certain -- who fit a certain statistical profile, which wasn't -- this is different from what most people think -- how hard they threw. There is an obsession made about how pitchers throw.
COOPER: Right.
LEWIS: And, instead, they looked at sort of how they performed. They looked at a lot of things, strikeout-to-walk ratio, various things, and drafted them in bulk, a certain kind of pitcher. And, as a result, they're rich throughout the organization in pitching because in fact this was a good way to go about it.
COOPER: So when this book came out, we were talking about this before, you said it sort of ignited this whole discussion about this. Some people hated the book and thought that -- or they didn't like not the book itself, but the ideas expressed in it, the whole philosophy.
LEWIS: I'm sure somebody hated the book.
(LAUGHTER)
LEWIS: But it was interesting is that the only -- the book was seized upon by other professional sports and especially on Wall Street, because Wall Street people saw this for what it was, which was Wall Street kind of thinking. They were looking at baseball players as a market and trying to find undervalued players and overvalued players that they would then sell.
COOPER: Because you described Billy Beane almost in
(CROSSTALK)
LEWIS: As a Wall Street trader.
COOPER: As a Wall Streeter.
LEWIS: That's right. And so Wall Street saw this and said, this is exactly what we do. And that's in fact what the Oakland A's front office would tell you, is that we're bringing a kind of Wall Street approach to the game.
COOPER: And that Wall Street approach is, you say now it's spreading throughout the game.
LEWIS: It is spreading, because organizations that are in crisis or that get new owners see that this is a very smart way to run your business. And so the Toronto Blue Jays, the Boston Red Sox and now the Los Angeles Dodgers have all hired either Billy Beane disciples or people who worked right with him. But inside the game, it created a very hostile response. I didn't think of it as a controversial story. I thought of it as kind of an inspirational tale, these underdogs.But it was controversial inside the game, because it was saying, in so many words, that the way you're doing your business isn't so bright. And if you're an owner of one of these teams who is spending $100 million to watch your team lose from year to year, what do you're doing? What do you -- do you have any way of rationally -- of evaluating the people who build your baseball team?
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: George Steinbrenner is not going to read this and say to himself, you know what, I've been going about this all wrong.
LEWIS: No, because he can afford to make as many mistakes as he wants. He could make every mistake in the world and still have the best baseball team.
COOPER: Right.
LEWIS: Because he got to spend $200 million on baseball players. That's now almost five times what the Oakland A's are spending. And but the reason that he can -- it is a luxury he has because his revenues are so much greater than the other teams. But he can go out and make some huge mistake by buying a player for a huge sum of money who doesn't work out. And if he doesn't work out, he just throws him on the scrap heap and goes and gets another one. So the Yankees don't think about this so much. But a lot of other teams do. And
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: And a lot of other ones are thinking about this.
(CROSSTALK)
LEWIS: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. And the effect is to bring a different kind of player into the game in a way because it -- if you are sort of subverting the prejudices of the market as it is to find other kinds of players, it gives all sorts of people who might not have an opportunity an opportunity.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Fascinating. The book is "Moneyball." Michael Lewis, thank you.
LEWIS: Thanks for having me.
COOPER: All right. Well, still ahead on NEWSNIGHT, we're going check in on our top story and take a look at what we'll have tomorrow. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Before we go, a quick recap of our top story.In Iraq, firefights erupted in the Sunni city of Fallujah, as U.S. Marines move to seal off the city in response to the killing and mutilation of four American security guards there last week and in the Shia sections of Baghdad, as an arrest warrant was sworn out against a militant cleric.Tomorrow on NEWSNIGHT, the terrible story of Rwanda. Ten years go this month, almost one million people murdered as the world stood by and watched. How did it happen? How could it happen? Could it happen again? That is tomorrow night, 10:00 p.m. Eastern.Thanks very much for joining us. See you tomorrow.
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