CNN - Judy Woodruff's Inside Politics -Transcript

JUDY WOODRUFF'S INSIDE POLITICS 15:30 March 4, 2004 Thursday

CNN

SHOW: JUDY WOODRUFF'S INSIDE POLITICS 15:30

HEADLINE: Bush Ad Backlash; Team Kerry: The Inner Circle

GUESTS: Jeanne Shaheen, Tom Cole, Paul Farhi, Fred Wertheimer, Bob Bauer

BYLINE: Judy Woodruff, Robert Novak, William Schneider, Jeanne Meserve, Suzanne Malveaux

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Representative Tom Cole joins me now from Capitol Hill. Congressman, I want to ask you about what you did say. You said, " I promise this: if George Bush loses the election, Osama bin Laden wins the election." What are you saying about John Kerry with that statement?

REP. TOM COLE ®, OKLAHOMA: I'm not saying a thing at all about John Kerry, a person, frankly, whom I respect, but disagree with quite profoundly.

What I am saying is that at a time of war, if our commander in chief is defeated in election, our adversaries will regard that as a triumph. And I think without question, George Bush, who's led decisively, ably and, frankly, quite aggressively during this confrontation with terror, is somebody that Osama bin Laden does not want to see reelected.

WOODRUFF: Well if you follow that argument to its conclusion, you would say we shouldn't have an election...

COLE: No, not at all. We had an election in 1944. We had an election in 1864. But I think it would have been fair to say in 1864, "If Lincoln loses the election, Jefferson Davis is going to be a happy guy." And I think it would have been fair to say in 1944, had Roosevelt, who laid down the Doctrine of Unconditional Surrender, lost the election it would have been interpreted by the Germans and Japanese as a good thing, not a bad thing.

WOODRUFF: So when you said, "What do you think Hitler would have thought if Roosevelt would have lost?", I mean essentially you're saying al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden would be pleased, would take heart if George Bush were to lose?

COLE: Oh, I think without question they would take heart. It's been George Bush who's been at the forefront of protecting our country, waging an aggressive war against al Qaeda. He's visited war upon the enemy, instead of allow them to visit it upon us. I think he's been an absolutely brilliant and steadfast leader at a time of great crisis.

So I have no doubt that our enemies, particularly al Qaeda, would like to see him out of office.

WOODRUFF: In other words, again, it's OK to have an election but it's not OK to reconsider...

COLE: It's always OK. The American people make that judgment. That's why we have elections. We had-we're the first country in the world to have an election during the middle of a civil war on our own soil.

WOODRUFF: So you don't believe you owe anybody an apology?

COLE: Absolutely not. Frankly I think the president is owned an apology to the pounding he's gotten in the course of this. There's a little bit of, I think, of sort of trying to change the subject because Democrats I think have been absolutely brutal to the president in the course of his campaign.

His service to the country has been questioned. His leadership's been questioned. People have said he lied about things to the American people, misled them into war, manipulated them. Anybody deserves to be apologized to it's George Bush.

WOODRUFF: All right. Congressman Tom Cole, Republican of Oklahoma.

COLE: Thank you very much.

WOODRUFF: Thank you very much. We appreciate it.

COLE: My pleasure.