CBS Face the Nation - Transcript

CBS Face the Nation - Transcript

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PELLEY: With us now Ned Lamont, the Democratic nominee in the Connecticut Senate race.

Thank you for being with us.

Mr. NED LAMONT (Democratic Senate Nominee, Connecticut): Scott, delighted to be here.

PELLEY: On Tuesday, it looked like a pretty good idea to run against the war in a Democrat Primary, then Wednesday the plot came up that was revealed of the bombing of--potential bombing of airliners into the United States. I wonder, with so much difference between Tuesday and Wednesday, are you a manwhose time has come and gone?

Mr. LAMONT: No, on the contrary. I don't think our invasion of Iraq has done anything when it comes to the real war on terror. I mean, here we are talking about Saddam Hussein, but look what happened. It was a terrorist cell coming out of Pak--Pakistan, going through London, threatening the United States of America five years later. You know, if nothing else I think our
country's gotten a little bit complacent when it comes to the war on terror right now. Maybe this is a wake-up call. Maybe we'll take into account the 9/11 Commission recommendations when it comes to homeland security, be it the ports, public transportation, airports, nuclear facilities. I think this is a time for America to be vigilant.

PELLEY: I should mention that we invited Senator Lieberman to be on the broadcast. Even though you defeated him in the Democrat primary, he's decided to run as an independent in the general election, but Senator Lieberman is attending the wedding of his daughter this weekend, and it's undoubtedly a more pleasant thing to do than be on FACE THE NATION.

Mr. LAMONT: Well, congratulations to the Senator and his wife.

PELLEY: When should the troops come out? You have said that it might be as early as next July, less than a year from now. What would that mean?

Mr. LAMONT: Well, first of all, we've been there for three and a half years. By the end of this year we'll have been there longer than we were involved in World War II. And let's face it, our very front line military presence, having 132,000 troops stuck in the middle of this bloody civil war, is not making the situation better. I say the situation's getting worse, and it's getting worse consistently. So now is the time for a change of strategy. That's the big difference between me and the senator--and the president, by that token.

I think it's time to change strategy. I think it is time for us to start bringing our troops home, and it's time for us to tell the Iraqis `It's your country and only we'll be able to solve this.' We'll be there in the background. We'll be there for political support, humanitarian support, reconstruction. We're going to take this very American face off the occupation. That's our best hope for success in Iraq.

PELLEY: Isn't that a recipe for chaos?

Mr. LAMONT: We have chaos. Look at what's going on over the last couple years. You know, 3,000 dead last month alone. You know, I don't think you can just keep doing what we're doing. That's a recipe for disaster. And that's why I really believe that if we get back, pull back from the front line, that's when the Iraqis will step up. I have confidence they will.

PELLEY: Let me read something to you that Senator Lieberman said about you. Quote, "If we just pick up like Ned Lamont wants us to do, and get out of Iraq by a date certain, it will be taken as a tremendous victory by the same people who wanted to blow up these planes."

Mr. LAMONT: I'm afraid us being bogged down in that civil war is being taken by a victory by some of those people. That's why it's so important we change course, and that's why it's so important we get our eye back on the ball when it comes to working with our allies, shared intelligence like, you know, Pat Roberts was just saying. You know, dealing with a war in a--war on terror in a serious way. I think the war in Iraq has been a terrible distraction from taking care of the people's business.

PELLEY: President Bush says we're safer today than we were on 9/11, and frankly there have been no attacks, successful attacks in the United States since then. A number of attacks had been foiled. Is he wrong?

Mr. LAMONT: I think he's wrong. You know, I think that's a false sense of security again, you know, the fact that we haven't been attacked since 9/11. You know, Bill Clinton could have said that after the first, you know, attack on the World Trade Center. The idea that we're going to fight them there so we don't have to fight them here, the number of terrorist attacks around the country--looking at London, looking at Madrid, looking around the world--is on the rise. And that's why this is no time for us to lower our guard.

PELLEY: Our CBS News polling in your race showed that among Democrats in Connecticut, more than 80 percent said the war was important to them in their vote. Now that's one state, and just the Democrat Party. The question is, do you think an anti-war candidate can win the presidency in 2008?

Mr. LAMONT: It's not a question of being an anti-war candidate. It's a question of is our country making the right decisions that allow us to prevail going forward? And I'd argue that we're not. I'd say we're making a lot of bad decisions. As I go around the state of Connecticut, people ask me about $9 trillion in debt. What type of a country we are? Should we--we should be
investing in our kids and investing in our future, and instead we're mortgaging our kids' future. That's wrong. People talk to me about 63 lobbyists for every single congressman in Washington, DC. That number has doubled in the last five years alone. Who's really taking care of the people's business down there? We know who the lobbyists are taking care of.

PELLEY: A poll as recently as July showed you losing a three-way race with Senator Lieberman in the race as an independent by a fairly large margin. Have you seen any polling since then that suggests you have a chance?

Mr. LAMONT: Well, two things. I've seen polling that says it's very tight going into a three-way race. But more importantly, Scott, do I care? I mean, when I got into this race, I wasn't even an asterisk, as everybody knows. I really believed that this country was headed in the wrong direction. It was time for somebody to challenge the Bush administration and put forward a
positive, constructive alternative to what they're doing, starting with the war on terror, and looking at the war in Iraq; looking at the investments we should be making in this country. We're going to do just fine in November, and I'm not going to worry about polls along the way.

PELLEY: Senator Lieberman has said that he would vote with the Democratic caucus if he was elected as an independent. What difference would it make if you were elected instead?

Mr. LAMONT: Because I'm going to stand up and represent real change in Washington, DC, represent how we're doing business down there. Look, I'm a guy that started up a business from scratch. I bring a different background to Washington. We've got an awful lot of career politicians down there. I'll give you one example: We have a health care system in this country I think is broken. I think it's broken not only because we have 47 million people with absolutely no health insurance, but as a small business guy, I can tell that the high costs are beginning to crush entrepreneurship in this country. And that more and more working families are being bankrupted. You know, for 18 years our government's done very little when it comes to dealing with the health care crisis in this country. I think as a business person I can talk to Republicans and Democrats, labor and management, and deal with an issue like that in a serious way.

PELLEY: Running as an anti-war candidate in Connecticut, in the Democrat primary--again, a very small slice of the national pie--what lesson should the Democratic Party take from your victory when looking at the nation as a whole?

Mr. LAMONT: Well a couple things. I can't talk about the Democratic Party as a whole. I've been a guy that's been traveling around the state of Connecticut, the land of steady habits as they call us, and they voted for a change. And I really think that it's time for political leaders to stand up and be bold. Talk to the American people, they know we've got to make some
real changes. We're more dependent upon foreign capital, we're more dependent upon foreign oil. Let's make the real choices that'll help our security and invest in our future so our kids have better opportunities. And be clear.

PELLEY: What would you do differently than the Bush administration in the war on terror? Not the war on Iraq, but the war on terror? What would the difference be?

Mr. LAMONT: Look, we're always going to have the strongest military on the face of this earth, Scott. But I think we're a stronger country and we're more secure, we work in concert with our allies, and we stay true to our values, and we treat the rest of the world with respect. I think we've lost some of that right now.

It was Abe Ribicoff, our senator from Connecticut, who some years ago said, `The United States is most influential and most helpful when we have credibility and respect throughout the Middle East region and throughout the world.' I think we lost a lot of that, and it's time for us to regain it.

PELLEY: Senator Lieberman, like a lot of Democrats, voted to authorize the war, and there are people who believe that that's one reason he lost the race to you. Do you believe other Democrats should disavow their votes to authorize the war? Just quickly.

Mr. LAMONT: No. I think that was three and a half years ago. They looked at the intelligence being presented to them, and there were some Democrats, a lot of them, that supported that. Three and a half years later, many of them have the courage to say the facts were wrong, look what's going on on the ground, it's time to change.

PELLEY: Thank you very much for being with us. We'll leave it there.

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