[Harris:] And quickly let's get a check of the stocks this morning. Wall Street coming up on I guess it's close to an hour into the trading day. The Dow, as you can see, down 37 points. Nasdaq down 17. I don't know, Heidi, maybe the market's are reacting to changes at the top of Viacom. A big media company. Maybe changes at the top at Ford.
[Collins:] Ford, yes. Interesting change.
[Harris:] We'll take up these issues with Susan Lisovicz a little later.
[Collins:] Very good. We'll look at that. Also want to remind you that President Bush is meet with his cabinet as we speak. We understand that we will get some pictures of that meeting in just a couple of minutes, as soon as they become available. Also, his third speech, the war on terror speeches that he's been giving, sort of a series of those, will take place today at 1:45. We will have our coverage of that as you see there on the screen. Meanwhile, the president tweaks his terror message five years after 911. Has the enemy changed as well? CNN's Kelli Arena now on the threat from Osama bin Laden.
[Kelli Arena, Cnn Correspondent:] A crippled organization. Most of its leaders in custody or dead. Its base of operations destroyed. That's how the president has described al Qaeda in the recent past. Barely mentioning Osama bin Laden's name until now.
[George W. Bush, President Of The United States:] Bin Laden and his terrorist allies have made their intentions as clear as Lenin and Hitler before them.
[Arena:] Now the president is talking about how al Qaeda and terrorists that inspired are successfully using the Internet to recruit and train, how they're influencing western-born citizens to join their cause and how they nearly pulled off another 911-style attack.
[Bush:] Most recently they attempted to strike again in the most ambitious plot since the attacks of September the 11th. A plan to blow up passenger planes headed for America over the Atlantic Ocean.
[Arena:] Is al Qaeda running scared or should we be? What's changed to turn what the president described as a battered organization into a serious threat? Well, part of the answer is that plot to blow up airliners. Just before it was revealed last month, two top government counterterrorism officials privately said that they didn't think al Qaeda was still capable of a large-scale attack. Analysts suggest that plot served as a wake-up call.
[Bruce Hoffman, Georgetown University:] I think there's a very good saying that sums it up and that's, the more things change, the more they stay the same. And I think whatever optimism we might have had has certainly been challenged in the past month.
[Arena:] Some see politics at play here. That the closer we get to the midterm elections, the more the specter of a potent and dangerous al Qaeda suits the president and his party. But whatever the motivation, analysts say that the new and more alarming rhetoric may be closer to the mark than the old, we're winning message. Kelli Arena, CNN, Washington.
[Collins:] You can catch more of Kelli Arena's report on "Anderson Cooper 360." Watch "AC 360" weeknights at 10:00 Eastern only on
[Cnn. Harris:] Two months until the midterm elections in November. A season of discontent for voters? Democrats hope so. They're trying to capitalize on public dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq and the way President Bush is handling it. Howard Dean built on those themes in his 2004 president's bid and now as chairman of the Democratic National Committee he joins us from Burlington, Vermont. Dr. Dean, good to see you.
[Howard Dean, Democratic National Committee Chairman:] Thanks for having me on.
[Harris:] Hey, let me just sort of get your thinking, so close, just two months, before the midterms. Are Democrats going to win the House?
[Dean:] Well, we certainly have a good shot at winning the House, and we have a decent shot at winning the Senate. I think people really want a new direction in this country. I think they're tired of the misleading things that the president said. They're tired of the war in Iraq, which is essentially a civil war at this point. And I honestly think that all this emphasis on the defense is going to help us because I think people finally realize that the president has not made America safer and what they want is a group of people who are going to be tough and smart, not just talk tough at election time.
[Harris:] OK. Let's take you at your word. Your belief that you, the Democrats, will win the house, get the 15 seats. Hold on to what you have and get the additional seeds needed. What is going to be the difference next year?
[Dean:] Well, I think it will be a huge difference. First of all, we'll put a check on the president's crazy economic policies where we've expanded the deficits enormously. One of the ideas that has been put forward, which I strongly recommend, is the idea of going back to what Bill Clinton used in order to balance the budget, which is a pay as you go. You can't spend more money on programs or tax programs for the oil companies and so forth unless you say where you're going to get the money. Secondly, we're going to raise the minimum wage without giving some big chunks of money away to the Republican donors and so forth as the president tried to do. We're just going to and the next thing we're going to do is have ethics reform in Congress. We've promise that. We want to ban jet plane rides and free meals and all these free junkets that the Republicans have taken. We want honesty and openness back in our government. These are the first three things, I think.
[Harris:] Where do you have common ground on any of those issues with the president right now? Because at some point you have to work with the president.
[Dean:] There's not a lot of common ground with the president. This is the most far right president we've seen certainly in my lifetime. Frankly, the Republicans are out of the mainstream in terms of what they're doing to the country. Most people don't agree with the direction they're leading us in. They want a different direction. So we would encourage the president to work with us to help make it easier, instead of harder, for middle-class people to go to college. Make it easier to get health insurance, not harder. And let's come up with a real solution that works to fight the war on terror and not keep us bogged down in a civil war in Iraq.
[Harris:] Gotcha. So if there is, as you describe it, no real common ground that you can see right now, boy, how do you move forward? How does the next Congress do anything more than the current Congress? And aren't we talking about gridlock again?
[Dean:] It's our hope that after this election that the president will begin to move back towards the moderation that we need in this country. The thoughtful middle where we can be tough and smart in the war on terror, not just tough. Where's we don't give huge, no-bid contracts to people who were formerly associated with the members of the administration. Where we don't give huge tax breaks away to oil companies and insurance companies. Surely those things are going to be helpful for America and we're hoping that the Republicans, should they end up in the minority, will at least agree with some of those.
[Harris:] Got a couple of other points I want to get to. Unemployment at 4.7 percent. The president said the tax cuts are responsible and should be made permanent. Labor Secretary Chao says this about the incomes of Americans. Take a listen to this and then I've got a question for you.
[Elaine Chao, Labor Secretary:] Tax basis. Personal income has actually risen. And it's very important to know that. Because of the president's tax cut, the after-tax disposable income increased 9.2 percent since 2001.
[Harris:] Well, what do you make of that? And...
[Dean:] I think that's true. It increased dramatically for people like me and Bill Clinton and it went down for 80 percent of Americans. The reason the president's so frustrated, because the economic numbers are good, is because the voters know they're not good for them. Eighty percent of Americans have seen a substantial decrease in their income every year since George Bush has been president. A million of them have lost their health insurance every year since George Bush has been president. The Republicans just cut Pelle Grants and raised interest rates on college loans. It is harder and harder to hang on to being a middle class person in this country. And so they can make the numbers say whatever they want. And I'm, you know, personally I benefited from the president's tax cuts. But they're bad for America because they've hurt middle class people. It's more expensive to stay in the middle class today than it was even though it's easier for people like me.
[Harris:] OK. Let me just switch before I run out of time with you. I want to talk about Iraq. Just a couple of thoughts. Is it time, in your estimation, for this country to bring them the men and women home in a phased out way?
[Dean:] Yes, in a phased out way it certainly is. We're not going to bring them all home. We can't do that. We do have a serious war on terror to fight. But the war of Iraq was a war of the president's choosing. Saddam Hussein was not a threat to America, as dreadful a human being as we was. We've essentially met our objective over there. We got rid of Saddam Hussein. Now we're in the middle of a civil war where we have no business. And we do need more folks in Afghanistan. We have a redeployment plan that some of us have agreed with which calls for maintaining a force in the Middle East so that we can deal with terrorists threats. But the guard and reserve don't belong to Iraq and they ought to be home.
[Harris:] And one final question. The president is going to talk about Guantanamo Bay, what to do with detainees. What's your thought on than?
[Dean:] I think there's a middle road. I think Senator Lindsay Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, a lawyer in the JAG, understands this issue well. You can't you got to obey the law. That's the problem with the president. Look, all of us want to be tough on terrorists, but you've got to obey the law, and that's where the president fell down. So there is a middle way where we can get the information that we need, where we can imprison terrorists but we don't remove the liberties and freedoms of Americans while we do that. And that's what we seek. And I think Senator Graham, hard for me to say nice things about a Republican as the Democratic chair, but, you know, I think when you have a good idea, we out to support that one, too.
[Harris:] You did fine.
[Dean:] I think Senator Graham and others are going to come out with a decent idea there.
[Harris:] You did just fine with that.
[Dean:] Thank you.
[Harris:] The chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Howard Dean. Howard, thank you. The Republican view of the midterm elections. We will hear from the party's communications director, Brian Jones. He is coming up next in the
[Newsroom. Collins:] Also want to remind you we're waiting on getting some pictures of President Bush with his cabinet. They are meeting at we speak and we will bring those to you as soon as we get them. Also, his third war on terror speech coming up a little bit later this afternoon at 1:45. We'll have live coverage as well of that. CNN, the most trusted name in news.