Interview With Former Homeland Security Chief Tom Ridge; Interview With Tom Ridge; Obama Adviser Under Fire
MALVEAUX: You're in THE SITUATION ROOM. Happening now: Afghan outrage at NATO, after an airstrike targeting Taliban militants also kills civilians. What went wrong, and can an apology by the allies repair the damage? Also, an exclusive interview with the son of the Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. Was the release of the Lockerbie bomber part of a larger deal for Libyan oil? New details in a growing controversy. And man overboard. A passenger plunged from a cruise ship, but is saved in a dramatic rescue by another ship, all of it caught on tape. Wolf Blitzer is off today. I'm Suzanne Malveaux, and you're in THE SITUATION ROOM. An explosive allegation from a former top official in the Bush administration, Tom Ridge. The first secretary of homeland security writes in his new book that he was pressured to raise the terror alert level just before the 2004 presidential election. Tom Ridge is joining us here live here in THE SITUATION ROOM. Good to have you here.</s>TOM RIDGE, FORMER HOMELAND SECURITY CHIEF: Very nice to join you. Thank you.</s>MALVEAUX: I have been reading -- reading this book. I have had a little time to look it over. Obviously, the better part of last week, you have been making a distinction between what you have written here, the question that you raised about whether or not the terror alert level should have been raised, and the recommendations by Bush administration officials, whether it was based on politics or security. What has -- what has been the fallout from that? Have you heard from people who you mention in the book, John Ashcroft or former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld?</s>RIDGE: Well, first of all, the distinction between -- there's a distinction between what I said in the book and what other people said and how other people have interpreted what I wrote. And I have said of a lot of folks, please read the book, because, early on in the book, in my words, not anybody else's words, I explain really how the system worked. We refer to that incredible dramatic event the weekend before the presidential election, but it's a process we had used before, where the Homeland Security Cabinet collectively has to decide whether to raise the threat level. And I take you back to those incredible days. I use the word dramatic because it was. But in March -- on March 11 of that year, an election in an ally, Spain, was affected by a terrorist attack. We raised the threat level in August. The same people that made the decision not to go up right in -- before election eve, the same people made the decision to go up in August. So, as I'm musing as I write the book after this, I say a couple of things. One, nobody pressured anybody. You have got a lot of strong-willed people sitting around that table. Nobody could pressure this group. And, secondly, the process existed so that, only when there was a collective opinion that we go up -- so, a lot of people have interpreted that their own way. But, if they read the book and read my words, particularly on page 114, they will understand the process and hopefully understand what I was getting at.</s>MALVEAUX: Have you gotten blowback from -- from anybody in the book who you write about...</s>RIDGE: Oh, of course. I mean, there were some people...</s>MALVEAUX: ... from Ashcroft or -- or from Rumsfeld?</s>RIDGE: Well, I have had a good...</s>MALVEAUX: Have they reached out to you?</s>RIDGE: ... good -- good conversation with John. I haven't had a chance to talk to Secretary Rumsfeld...</s>MALVEAUX: But what did he say?</s>RIDGE: ... but these are men that I worked with several years whom I respect, and I'm not second-guessing their motivation. I'm just trying to relate, after a couple of the years, the drama of the moment but, more importantly, the process that worked, because that's not the only time we sat around the table. In this instance it was a video conference. Everybody sitting in their office. We take a look at the bin Laden tape. We say to ourselves, should we go up, should we not? A couple of my colleagues argued -- not argued, but basically said, we think we need to go up. John Ashcroft said that, Don Rumsfeld said that, rendered their opinion on other occasions. In this instance, they were in the minority. We don't go up. The process worked.</s>MALVEAUX: What did John Ashcroft say to you afterwards when the book was released after the controversy?</s>RIDGE: Well, John and I had a great conversation. We worked together almost daily in the White House.</s>MALVEAUX: Was he upset with what happened?</s>RIDGE: Certainly didn't get a sense that he was upset. We had a good conversation. He said, we were friends before, we're friends know, and this little dustup has not affected our relationship at all.</s>MALVEAUX: To clear things up here, in the jacket cover you don't write this, but certainly your publisher writes this in the jacket cover of your book. It says, "He recounts" -- referring to you -- "the pressure that the DHS received to connect homeland security to the international war on terror and to raise the security alert on the eve of the 2004 presidential election." Will you have that taken out so that people don't get that message from you now that you're saying that's not the case?</s>RIDGE: It's a fair comment. We've had those discussions. That's why I've told some folks I understand what other people have said. And frankly, there are other people who jumped on that before they even read the book as well. So, I think the answer to all this -- this frenzy about what I said is, read what I said and then draw your own conclusions. Not what other people say.</s>MALVEAUX: I want to turn the corner here.</s>RIDGE: Sure.</s>MALVEAUX: There's a CNN/Opinion Research poll here that talks about really the kind of anger that's out there in the American people towards the government, angry about the way government in Washington is working. They say that -- 64 percent say that they are angry. This was compared to 72 percent back in 1994. And I want you to take a listen to opinions that have some from folks who are really just frustrated with the Obama administration.</s>RIDGE: OK.</s>MALVEAUX: This is a Tea Party.</s>RIDGE: I'll listen carefully.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You ready for a Tea Party?</s>CROWD: Yeah!</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I see the things that the Obama administration, the Democratic Congress are doing is really threatening the future of this country.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I believe he's trouncing the Constitution.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Question everything our government is doing.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's something happening. We don't know quite what it is, but it's happening. And people who ordinarily wouldn't turn out to the streets to protest are turning out to the streets to protest.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're the sleeping giant that has been awakened.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Afro-Leninsm (ph) coming to you on a silver platter, Barack Hussein Obama. He ain't my president, people.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How dare they give tens of trillions of dollars to banks and the people who caused the trouble?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It feels very grassroots to me, and I love that quality.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Some are feeling that they are losing control of the government, that the government is taking over control, that we're headed towards socialism.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And I don't want this to be a communist socialist nation. That's what our troops died for, so we would not be enslaved by the Nazis or the communists.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have the right for the government not to control my health care and my life.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And I have the right to disagree with you, sir.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm like the person they are going to say, take a pill and go die.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, Mr. Reid, Ms. Pelosi, support our troops in the United States Military!</s>MALVEAUX: You were the governor of a major state, obviously a cabinet secretary. What do you make of the tone and what is happening here in this country now, the mood toward the government?</s>RIDGE: Well, I think it's quite obvious from those snippets that we take our First Amendment freedoms very seriously. And in spite of the tone, I think there's just a lot of unrest and uneasiness. President Obama ran an incredible campaign, and he promised change. And I've often said that change was like a beverage glass, and during the campaign everybody was pouring their favorite beverage into the glass. But now that he's president, he's poured his own beverage into it and people don't quite like the taste. The tastes are big deficits. It's not a cap and trade bill. They think it's a cap and tax bill on energy. And really, this debate on health care scares a lot of people. It's 13 million people employed, $2.5 trillion business annually. And the notion that a 1,000-page bill written by a bunch of people that really don't know too much about the health care system might dramatically alter their access to it or the quality of their care. That has people scared. So, again, for me, I'd like to see the tone more civil, regardless of what the issue is. But people voted for change and they're not quite sure they like the direction the change is going now.</s>MALVEAUX: What do you think of the decision by the attorney general, Eric Holder, to appoint a prosecutor to look into possible abuses in CIA interrogations? We heard from former Vice President Dick Cheney saying it' was an outrage, but former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said he thought it was a good idea. Where do you fall on this issue?</s>RIDGE: I think it's a bad idea. I think these men were advised, told it was their responsibility to conduct investigations. And</s>MALVEAUX: Secretary Tom Ridge, thank you so much for joining us here in</s>THE SITUATION ROOM. RIDGE: Been a pleasure. Thank you.</s>MALVEAUX: An Obama administration official is finding himself in the spotlight that is getting hotter by the minute as some of his past words and deeds come back to haunt him. Our CNN's Mary Snow is looking into it for us. And Mary, tell us what this controversy is all about.</s>MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Suzanne, at the heart of it, questions about an adviser's links to a movement pushing conspiracy theories behind 9/11.</s>SNOW (voice-over): Van Jones may not be a well-known administration figure as an adviser for green jobs, but he's been thrust into the forefront over questions surrounding this 2004 petition he signed on the 9/11 Truth.org Web site demanding "... a call for immediate inquiry into evidence that suggests high-level government officials may have deliberately allowed the September 11th attacks to occur." Van Jones is listed as "Signer 46." Asked why his name is on it, an administration source tells CNN that Jones did not carefully review the language in the petition. And in a statement, Jones said, "I do not agree with this statement and it certainly does not reflect my views now or ever." White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs was asked about Jones' name appearing on the petition, responding, "It's not something the president agrees with," and that Jones continues to work in the administration. Jones has also gained attention for comments he made before his White House job, including this one now on YouTube when he was talking about Republicans.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How were the Republicans able to push things through when they had less than 60 senators but somehow we can't?</s>VAN JONES, OBAMA ADVISER: Well, the answer to that is they are</s>JONES: That's a technical term. And Barack Obama is not a</s>SNOW: In 2005, he was quoted in the "East Bay Express" saying, "By August, I was a communist" when explaining about his radicalization following the acquittals in the police beating case of Rodney King in 1992. Jones said, "If I had offended anyone with statements I made in the past, I apologize." The green jobs guru has come under scrutiny by conservatives, notably Fox TV host Glenn Beck. Defenders of Jones say Beck targeted him because Jones was formerly with a group now working to get advertisers to boycott Beck's show. The boycott came after the Fox host called President Obama a racist. Before this, Jones was primarily known for his environmental work. Back in May, in comments on The San Francisco Chronicle's Web site, Jones even won the praise of former eBay CEO Meg Whitman, now a Republican candidate for governor in California.</s>MEG WHITMAN, FMR. EBAY CEO: He's done a marvelous job.</s>SNOW: Whitman now says she didn't know Jones well and is distancing herself, saying it's clear he holds views she entirely rejects.</s>SNOW: And Suzanne, the pressure is growing. Congressman Mike Pence, the chairman of the House Republican Conference, is reportedly calling on Jones to be fired or step down. And Republican Senator Kit Bond is now calling for a congressional oversight hearing looking into the fitness of Jones as a senior White House official -- Suzanne.</s>MALVEAUX: All right. Thank you, Mary. Well, a picture of an American war Marine dying, should is have been published, or is it that appalling and hurtful to the family? The defense secretary and family, they were outraged but, The Associated Press is explaining. And the White House is ready to reveal some well-kept secrets. They concern you. Is this an act of openness, or was there pressure to do it? And caught on tape, corruption in Iraq. Some say it is so bad, that Iraqis are regularly urged to bribe Iraqi officials.