Bush and McCain Face Voters in Michigan and Arizona
MATALIN: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. Only three days after the critical South Carolina primary, McCain and Bush face another crucial contest in Michigan today. McCain continued to pitch to crossovers while Bush crisscrossed the state to boost GOP turnout. And once again, with only about 15 minutes until polls close, pundits predict a race too close to call with turnout being the determinative factor. CNN will have full election coverage following CROSSFIRE, but first, former presidential warriors for opposing sides now: for McCain, Christian conservative Gary Bauer and for Bush, budget meister and new double-daddy Ohio Congressman John Kasich.</s>PRESS: Congressman Kasich, congratulations and welcome to</s>CROSSFIRE. KASICH: Hey, I have to tell you, I watched the debate last night at the Apollo Theater that the Democrats had and it was better than the WWF. I mean, I'd never seen anything like that, attacks and everything. It was unbelievable theater.</s>PRESS: Made those Republican debates look like Sunday school.</s>KASICH: It was amazing.</s>PRESS: If you were living in Michigan this time of this primary and you picked up the phone, you might hear a familiar voice coming to you about this primary. I'd like you to listen to a message that -- being -- has been heard in Michigan the last couple of days.</s>PAT ROBERTSON, BUSH SUPPORTER: Tomorrow's Republican primary may determine whether our dream becomes reality or whether the Republican party will nominate a man who wants to take First Amendment freedoms from citizens' groups while he gives unrestricted power to labor unions. A man who chose as his national campaign chairman, a vicious bigot, who wrote that conservative Christians in politics are anti- abortion, homophobes, and would-be censors. John McCain refused to repudiate these words.</s>PRESS: And that of course is the voice of reverend Pat Robertson, a Bush Supporter. I want to ask you congressman, do you believe that George Bush did not know about those telephone calls?</s>KASICH: Well, I can't speak for George Bush, Bill. But you know, I don't believe that George Bush would associate himself with those kind of phone calls. I really don't. And I -- look, I think that George Bush is a great man of faith. And I just don't think he would on the short, you know, try to take advantage or smear, you know, name call. But you know, these telephone calls have been going on between both campaigns. And you know, all it does is, in a sense -- of course, in South Carolina, it actually drove voter turnout up, which is pretty bizarre. But this is not good in the long term for the -- for our system and for politics in general: the name-calling, calling Bush -- saying that Bush is anti-catholic and this kind of a phone call -- I mean, it's just not what we ought to be doing in politics.</s>PRESS: Well, Gary Bauer is here tonight. I don't think anybody would ever doubt Gary Bauer's moral credentials. Do you think Gary Bauer would be supporting George Bush if he were not convinced -- I mean supporting John McCain -- I'm sorry, if he were not convinced that John McCain has strong moral character?</s>KASICH: Oh, I think John McCain has very strong moral character. I think...</s>PRESS: So where is Pat Robertson coming from?</s>KASICH: Now, Bill, you know, you've got to call Pat and ask him. Nobody tells Pat what to say or how to think. Pat's -- I know Pat very well. I know Mary knows him very well. Pat just -- Pat feels strongly about things, and he says what he thinks. And, you know, I don't always agree with him. And I don't agree with name calling in this case, but I don't think that -- I mean, George Bush would be make a huge mistake if he had been part of this. I don't believe that he is anymore than I think that John McCain knew about these calls that label Bush anti-Catholic because he went to Bob Jones.</s>MATALIN: Well, we're going to get to that in a minute, but let's talk about, Gary, the pattern that is emerging in this process, and it is simply that John McCain is not winning Republicans even in those states that he won -- the one state he won -- New Hampshire. He didn't win Republicans. He didn't win them in South Carolina, he didn't win them in Delaware, he's winning them nowhere. Non-Republicans are backing him four to one, but Republicans are backing Bush three to one. Tell me how do you win the Republican nomination, particularly when we look at the rest of the calendar which is going to be closed to non-Republicans, how are you going to win the nomination without winning Republicans?</s>BAUER: Well, Mary , I'm a little puzzled by this concern about independents and Reagan Democrats participating in our primary. That's something good. That's something we ought to encourage. It was just a few months ago that supporters of Governor Bush were saying that he was the only one that could win because all of these Democrats in Texas had voted for him. Now the Democrats are voting and independents are voting for Senator McCain, suddenly it's viewed as some sort of big problem. I -- you know -- I was following the questioning between Bill and John. I think there's a very important issue here and that is the effort to savage Senator McCain in this campaign. Mary, we need to make sure that the debate...</s>MATALIN: Not a victim, Gary.</s>BAUER: We need to make sure -- OK -- well, let me just...</s>MATALIN: I am not done with these Democrats, let me follow-up -- No, no, no, let me follow-up on the kind of Democrats that are coming into the party.</s>PRESS: Let him finish his sentence.</s>MATALIN: That's a whole different topic...</s>BAUER: What kind of Democrats are coming into the party?</s>MATALIN: Well, these kind of Democrats. Here's a McCain brochure: "Courage, integrity, reform -- paid for by John McCain 2000 -- even if you vote in Tuesday's Republican primary, you can still participate in future Democratic party, political activities."</s>BAUER: Of course you can.</s>MATALIN: The kind of Democrats that are coming over for Bush are staying over for Bush. What is being encouraged in Michigan and in South Carolina.</s>BAUER: Mary, come on, Mary, you're smarter than this. Mary: This is a John McCain...</s>BAUER: Well taken, it's fine, that's wonderful. So what? So you tell a Democrat that the vote.</s>BAUER: You can tell a Democrat he can vote in the Republican primary but he has to stop being a Democrat? The Reagan Democrats, Mary, that made the guy we work for...</s>MATALIN: Are now Bush Republicans.</s>BAUER: ... Who have the guy we work for president in two terms by overwhelming elections didn't leave the Democratic party. We lost them in the last two presidential elections when we got our heads handed to us. Mary: So Debbie Dingell, the wife of the huge Democratic leader, who got two turnout calls to vote...</s>BAUER: You know, Mary.</s>MATALIN: ... for McCain is going to stay and vote for McCain, right?</s>BAUER: You know, Mary, I've been in rallies all over Michigan, I didn't see Debbie Dingell. Who I saw were the kind of people that used to be at Reagan rallies: veterans; people that love their country; people that want to have a sense of honor again in the oval office; people who believe that we ought to appeal to the better angels of our nature instead of slash and burn campaign.</s>PRESS: John Kasich, I hear you wanting to jump in.</s>KASICH: You know, I'd like to just say...</s>PRESS: Go ahead, please.</s>KASICH: I want to just say one thing about this. And Gary, I love Gary Bauer. He's a man of deep compassion...</s>BAUER: Thank you, sir.</s>KASICH: ... and here comes the but, right? But there's not a but here. I think Gary, however, as Republicans, we've got to be careful that we may have people choosing the menu who aren't coming to the dinner. Now when Kevorkian's lawyer is up there trying to recruit Democrats into our primary, I think we've got to think about this as Republicans. In addition, Bill Schneider, your political expert on CNN made a comment I thought was pretty clever. He said the Reagan Democrats now are all Republicans. I get very concerned -- look, we want independents and Democrats to come into our party, but we don't want people who come into this party who then go back and are Democrats in the fall which is what we're going to see, a number of these.</s>BAUER: John.</s>KASICH: But, Gary, that's not even the issue.</s>BAUER: Yes, well, let me answer what you just said. John, if the Reagan Democrats were Republicans, we wouldn't have gotten 40 percent of the vote in the last two presidential elections. We even had the Reagan Republicans back since the last time Ronald Reagan ran for office. I was with John McCain in Michigan a couple of days ago and he was asked about Kevorkian's lawyer. He said he didn't want those votes.</s>KASICH: No, of course not.</s>BAUER: He wasn't campaigning for those vote. Of course not. So let's not raise straw men.</s>KASICH: Well, look I'm not trying to...</s>BAUER: The people in that audience are conservative Democrats who haven't seen a clear Republican message in the last two presidential races. They like John McCain. And that's why in the national polls, the guy that you and Mary are supporting, George Bush, is now tied with Al Gore, but Senator McCain, the guy I'm backing, has got a 15-point lead.</s>KASICH: Gary, my only point is, is that you may not have seen Debbie Dingell or Jack Kevorkian or his lawyer at this rally, but the fact is there is a concerted effort by a number of Democrats to hijack this election. Now...</s>BAUER: John, is Senator McCain...</s>KASICH: That's just an issue for us...</s>BAUER: Is senator McCain a conservative, John?</s>KASICH: That's just an issue for us to discuss in the future. But let me just say this to you.</s>PRESS: I want to jump...</s>KASICH: We're going to be heading into a number of primary states where only Republicans and people who come across and declare themselves Republicans are going to be able to vote. And I think that'll be healthy also for our party. But Gary, I'm just talking to you as a fellow Republican to make sure that...</s>BAUER: Right.</s>KASICH: ... we attract new people, but we don't have people coming in here and trying to disrupt things. I mean, the party faithful ought to choose its nominee.</s>BAUER: Then you ought to close the primaries, then, and only allow Republicans to vote. But you know, the wing of the party that liked us for years suddenly doesn't like it because they can no longer control the outcome.</s>PRESS: All right. Hold it.</s>KASICH: Well, Gary, you know, your dad was a truck driver; my dad was a mail man.</s>PRESS: Let me jump in here.</s>KASICH: We want blue collar Democrats. But I'm telling you, a lot of them have come over and they vote Republican, which has given us control of the House.</s>PRESS: All right, John, I just want to put you at ease, OK? I'm a Democrat. I don't belong to any organized party. I'm a Democrat. For you to think that Democrats have organized this is a total red herring. I want to...</s>KASICH: I'm not saying that, Bill.</s>PRESS: No, I want to quote -- but I want to quote Bill Schneider back you. Bill Schneider polled those Democrats that voted for John McCain. Do you know why they said they're voting for John McCain? Not to make mischief. They're voting for John McCain because they like him. But I've got a more important question for you, John, OK? There is somebody else who is around here, people think he's going away, he hasn't. He's the president of the United States. He had a news conference last week, and here is what he said about both of you guys' candidates that I would like to get on the table. President Clinton.</s>WILLIAM J. CLINTON, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They can't run against the longest economic expansion in history or the lowest crime rate in 30 years or the lowest welfare rolls in 30 years, the progress America has made in promoting peace around the world, or the fact that our party overrode theirs and passed the Family Leave, and it's benefited 20 million people and it hasn't hurt the economy.</s>PRESS: There's the question: The times are so good these days that if you ask the question, "Are you better off than you were seven years ago?" the answer is yes, John Kasich. Why make any change?</s>KASICH: Well, Bill, I think that, first of all, it's going to be a very tough election this fall. I have been saying that for a solid year, and I think Al Gore will be the nominee, and I think he'll be very aggressive and I think he'll be very tough. But Bill, I think people have kind of had enough of the whole Clinton-Gore thing intuitively? Now can Al Gore turn that around? You know, it's possible he can. But I think that people intuitively like George Bush, and I think they like John McCain, and I think that's going to be a big advantage. And I think, when I watched that debate last night, at that -- at the theater last night, I've got to tell you, they are so far out in left field they're not even on the field anymore. I think that the people are unsettled about the future, which is curious in a time when things are so good. And I think that the big issue is going to be about self-governing and about the ability of people to be decent to one another.</s>PRESS: All right.</s>BAUER: Bill...</s>PRESS: Gary, real quick.</s>BAUER: Yes, Bill, I think there's a lot to run against. There's the decline of the military, which is underfunded and overcommitted. There's the...</s>PRESS: All right, polls are closing, so we've got to go. Gary Bauer, thank you for being here.</s>BAUER: All right. OK, thank you.</s>PRESS: John Kasich, thank you so much for joining us, from Columbus, Ohio. Get back to changing diapers, and Mary Matalin and I will be back with closing comments.