Dr. James Zogby

James Zogby: Hi, and welcome to "Viewpoint," we'll discuss the proposed profiling plan with the ACLU.
We're going to talk to Rami Khouri of the Daily Star newspaper, and he'll be here with an analysis of the events in Lebanon and other foreign policy issues.

Then G.O.P. strategist Rich Galen will join us for a conversation about presidential politics and the McCain campaign.

But first, I want to tell you a story, on Friday, last Friday, July 11th, 2008, a state department official, with 25 years in the foreign service was sentenced to two concurrent one-year prison terms for threatening my life and using hate filled threats to violate the civil rights of myself and those on my staff.

Among his milder expressions was the statement "The only good Lebanese is a dead Lebanese" and "the only good Arab is a dead Arab."

But there was worse, of special note, in his final threat just this past spring, there were also threats directed at one of our affiliates, in an effort to get them to stop carrying the show.

In any case, the career attorneys at the Department of Justice Civil Rights division and the F.B.I. agents that work with them investigating rights violators, deserve real credit for tracking down and prosecuting this individual and others, who perpetrated hate crimes against Arab Americans and American Muslims.

At the same time I have serious questions I want to raise about the behavior of the U.S. Department of State in this affair. They were aware of and appeared to tolerate this person's behavior for years, that came out in court. And yet, despite their negatives, the vigorous work of law enforcement, the sentence meted out sends a clear message. That hate crimes won't be tolerated and for that, I'm grateful.

I'm joined by Caroline Fredrickson, I want to welcome her back. She's from the office of the American Civil Liberties Union. She leads all of the federal lobbying efforts, she's former Chief of Staff to U.S. Maria Cantwell and served as Special Assistant to the President, during the Clinton Administration.

Thanks for joining us again.

Caroline Fredrickson: Pleasure.

JZ: I want to talk about the stuff we started dealing with last week. Let's talk about what we don't know. Because I think a lot of the mystery in the wiretapping in general and the new guidelines in domestic intelligence, all deal with what we don't know.

Do we have an idea or reason to suspect, how the warrantless wiretaps work.
Do we know anything about this process?

CF: That's a great question.

And you know, I would step back from that for a second and think about the fact that the complaining just passed legislation in this area and no, we don't know enough about it.

What is so unfortunate, was that rather than try and get a grasp on and understand what our government has been doing, what is the breadth of the surveillance, how many people have been affected. Has the information been misused? Are there other legal violations? What is the argument, what is the theory behind the wiretapping program?

Knowing that was explored by Congress but they went ahead and passed legislation that grants the president sweeping powers.

In terms of when the power is now given to the president, the executive branch through the legislation, they can capture all communication that has any international aspect. That could be visiting a website overseas or calling for information from a company that happens to use contractors, say, in India or the Philippines or anywhere else around the world or for somebody's whose child is traveling overseas during college and they want to talk to them. All of those calls and e-mails are obtainable by our government with no warrant.

JZ: Do we have any idea how the technology works that makes this possible, do they swoop this out of the air? Do they screen them, filter them?

CF: I think they use multiple mechanisms.

They go plug right into the communications backbone and from what we understand, again, not because Congress has done oversight but because there's a court case going on in San Francisco that involves the company AT&T, we know in that case, they actually have technology that plugs right into the AT&T infrastructure, that duplicated all communications, that would also include purely domestic communications.

Those e-mails and phone calls, as well as text messages that make made a perfect copy of them.

JZ: So it is not a question of surveilling terrorism, or terrorists, it is that no phone call is private.

CF: That's exactly right.

I think the irony here in some ways is President Bush when this program was first discovered by the "New York Times" and written about the White House came up with a name for it. They called it the terrorist surveillance program.

They said at that time that they were listening to phone calls where somebody on the other end was a terrorist, was a member of Al Qaeda or was a suspected terrorist.

And what has certainly evolved into more, Congress has now given its own blessing to, is that it is no longer a terrorist surveillance program.

It is an everyone surveillance program.

JZ: Let me put two quotes up, one is from a supporter of the new law and the other from the opponent.

Let's first look at the supporter.

It is Walt Halperin, head of the ACLU.

Let's hear what he hey has to say.

He says the compromise legislation is not what I would have liked to see.

JZ: The terrorist Czar from the first Administration and now with the Bush Administration a little bit before he stepped back.

This is his quote.

JZ: First to Walt Halperin, this was a guy who has been himself a victim of illegal wiretaps. And yet, he's coming out, defending this bill, saying it provides all of the protections necessary.

How do you respond to that?

CF: I think it is unfortunate, we disagree very strongly with ward Halperin, his own organization opened the society policy center disagrees with his position very strongly and opposed the bill.

People have to understand that what has existed prior to the legislation that was recently signed into law by the president was a framework that was a response to excessive government surveillance under the Nixon Administration and prior Administrations, where political enemies were surveilled and Congress understandably wanted to put some constraints on that and insure surveillance, even if the alleged reason was national security was operating in a system that protected basic fourth amendment privacy rights of Americans.

So that system required a Court that would approve warrants, so there was an inspection of whether this person should be surveilled.

The new law completely dispenses with that.

There's no requirement and no individualized suspicion, it allows wholesale surveillance of American communication that, happen to be international in any way, with no Court oversight at all of that surveillance, the only oversight is to look at the procedures, for targeting people overseas.

That's, the government has to show to the Court that they are targeting people that they reasonably believe to be overseas.

There's nothing about this specific, Americans that are being surveiled and there's no protections after the Court approves these really broad procedures.

JZ: You've gone to Court, you're assuming on this.

CF: We are.

It is a fourth amendment challenge.

That's the amendment to the constitution that requires that people have privacy in their homes, in their communications, and the government cannot actually invade that privacy without a warrant based on -- on probable cause.

So, if that is a critical protection in our constitution, as well as the first amendment, because the other flip side of this excessive surveillance is the sense that people who engage, particularly in international communications, and of a sense of this sort.

For example, we have some of the, of the plaintiffs in our case, are people that regularly talk to people in the Middle East, they, they are talking to people in, in reform movements and pro-democracy movements and people in the opposition party, in a country.

They're trying to track down what is going on in parts of Afghanistan, they don't want to compromise their sources, people are going to be afraid to talk to them, if they think

the American government is always going to be listening in.

JZ: If you already joined this conversation and got tapped, with or without warrants give us a call.

JZ: You spoke about Americans and a story, so sort of exploded in the media this week, because we passed a one million mark on the terrorist watch list, a million names, there was an op-ed in today' "Washington Post" saying it is not a million, it is 400,000.

Some are aliases and duplicate names, it is really only 400,000.

Then there was a line that caught my attention.

It was he kind of debunked the extreme nature of this list by saying, that, and it is not, Americans, 95% of the list are non-American.

And I thought that was -- means 5%, which would be 20,000 people on the terrorist watch list are American citizens.

CF: Right.

JZ: That's a pretty scary number of people.

If there are 20,000 terrorists running around the country, I like to know who they are.

But if they're in the, they're just on a list for some reason and they don't know the reason they're on the list.

You don't know why you're on the list, you have no right to appeal because you don't know you're on it, what -- how is the list formed?

Do we know and what do we -- do we know what impact it has on you if you're on the list?

CF: Those are good questions, because they get to the heart of the matter.

The first thing I also say, this sort of -- even the 20,000 which we both acknowledge is enormous really underrepresents the number of Americans affected.

First, if we believe his number, and the inspector general said there were 700,000 names on the list.

That's a question of where the accuracy is.

But when there are only 20,000 American names, if the name Joe Smith is on there, or the name Ted Kennedy, for example is one of the people on the list, there are probably a lot of people named Ted Kennedy, and Eddy Kennedy and all of those Americans

not just the Senator we know who has been on the watch list, but all of the people who share that name, that makes you wonder.

20,000 names means how many Americans are affected even under their numbers.

We don't know.

It is clear there is no standard, there's no one standard that prevails across the government for, for how these names get added to the list.

JZ: The danger here is yes, the fourth amendment is compromised that protects the individual citizens against unwarranted search and seizure.

Their person and their property.

But this is also this sense of the unknown.

How you get on the watch list, and how your calls are monitored, now with the new F.B.I. guidelines that we talked about last week, how you come under the radar -- there is -- this is kind of as Richard Clark suggested sort of a big brother aspect to all of this.

I think -- I was thinking the other day when we read "1984," there was this sense that this could not happen, but there's cameras monitoring you, and phone culls, this is --

CF: D.N.A. being collected.

JZ: This is a brave new world.

Let's go to South Carolina for a call.

Caller?

Caller: I'm a participating citizen, and I feel the situation is hopeless. What is -- is a person to do? What can they do?

JZ: I thank you for that.

That was going to be the last question. I didn't ask the right one. What can citizens do, what can be done about this?

CF: I always tell people this, I'm naturally an optimistic because otherwise how could I be the lead lobbyist during the Bush Administration.

It is a bit of an uphill battle.

I would say, engagement does matter.

People raising their voices.

Voting is critical, I'm very glad the caller is a regular voter and participates in all elections.

That's important, but do more. Call your Congresswoman, men and Senators. Call your mayors and governors, write your legislators. And engage in the ACLU that are active in policy matters at the state local and federal levels. Those matter.

I direct people to the website which is at www.acludoit.com.

You can take on all of these.

You can find the latest number of the watch list which is way over a million at this point.

JZ: Let's go to Colorado.

Caller: This is Mike.

JZ: Hi, Mike.

Caller: I have a question, if we are being recorded, why can't we order our transcripts?

CF: If the N.S.A. had a 1-800 line for transcripts, they would be flooded because they have a lot of them.

JZ: The phone companies that violated the law and -- and did all of this warrantless wiretapping before, are there records stored somewhere?

CF: Absolutely, absolutely. This is the issue of data mining.

JZ: Is there a window on this? Is there a sunset provision, do these calls get deleted at some point? There a capacity issue. My computer tells me, no more e-mails, you're done, delete. Is there a deletion issue?

CF: You make the point that makes me smile.
Several months ago, there was a Baltimore Suns story about the national security Administration, the N.S.A. which has been doing this warrantless wiretapping having problems with blackouts, because they don't have the infrastructure capable of maintaining all of the variety of computer systems, even though they're spying on everybody and getting their data, and they can't get their own house in order to keep the lights on, that's a sad situation.

JZ: The case of Shiekh Olmert, in New York, it turned out that there had been evidence available to team in boxes of materials that they had collected from the individual who had assassinated Maya Karhan that had linked him that he would be engaged in terrorist activity.

That sat in the office of the F.B.I. They had convicted the guy. Is that going on, in the sense that they're storing and storing and they don't know what to do with it all?

CF: Do you remember the first "Raiders of the Lost Ark", do you remember they find the lost ark and they take it to the government warehouse and there are boxes and boxes and boxes?

That was a funny moment at the time, until we put it in context here, I think that is actually completely accurate and what we understand about 9/11 is very similar. The information was there they didn't translate it, they didn't listen to calls they had. They didn't read the e-mails and listen to the F.B.I. agents that were telling them, there were suspicious signals.

JZ: Good old-fashioned policing can do the job, if you do the job.

Hello, caller.

Caller: My question is, you're an attorney, I'm talking to you and I'm being wiretapped, what does that mean for me?

JZ: That's what we don't know, if you're being monitored. We don't know what triggers and what -- what sets off the alarm bells. Is that right?

CF: That's right. What is disturbing, though, with Congress and the legislation that was just passed and signed by the president into law, it really opens the doors on all sorts of surveillance with very little, in terms of checks and balances and little oversight, so perhaps, if they're interested, yes. If they're not interested, no. But they do have a lot more power now than they used to.

JZ: We're running out of time. I'll take a couple of calls. We'll take two and then go to Caroline. Montana, first.

Caller: Yeah, I been down in Mexico and -- and my calls, I think have been monitored, I hear this big hollow noise coming across when I call.

I think that's when it all started.

Are you still there?

When I think about it all starting, you know, how did he it all started, the roots of it all.

I begin to think of the most sophisticated air network to fall down while the planes fly around for an hour and a half, and get away with it without being killed. They lost pressure and followed them to South Dakota until they dropped into the ground.

I look at that and I say, you know, how can America turn away, here we are to the point, where we want this man to bring us into this phony war and me being a Vietnam veteran, it hurts us going in, I see this whole thing going in, the Taliban, and bombing the statues.

JZ: I'm stopping you because I need to get another call in.

North Carolina, caller. Your question.

Caller: We know that they can -- they can see through walls, now they can tap our phones, our license mates are read. Credit cards.

JZ: Right.

Caller:, et cetera, et cetera.

Where is it going to end? How can one little mother that lives way out in the country do anything about it?

JZ: Thank you.

CF: I think there's another issue that the recent caller raised, which we haven't talked about is the satellite imagery that the government has been using and wants to use for more expansive purposes.

It has been used by FEMA, by the Federal Emergency Management Address to help people in distress, but they want to -- want to expand it to look at people in their own houses.

It is incredibly sophisticated technology that can get granular pictures way down in the ground from up in the satellite.

So it is really, it is a brave new world. It is -- it is more than you know, 1984 could have ever envisioned and I think we all really need to be vigilant, because you know, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.

JZ: Thank you, I think so long as we have the ACLU on the job, those of us card carrying members can feel a little more secure.

Thank you.

When we come back, Rami Khouri and more of your calls.

Jim Zogby: Welcome back, my next guest is Director of the Institute of Public Policy and International Affairs at the University of Beirut. And he works at the Daily Star newspaper in Lebanon, he's an author and co-recipient of the 2006 international peace prize.

Thank you for joining us.

He's here at the Woodrow Wilson Center. We're going to get you back again before you leave. Thank you for being with us.

Let me start with Lebanon, the new government. With Hezbollah getting what they call blocking third.

We talked about that on the show before, and there aren't enough seats in the cabinet to be able to block decisions they don't like.

The question is, how fragile is the situation? And -- and will the government be able to act or is there ñ is this a recipe for permanent paralysis?

Rami Khouri: It is not paralysis. They each have a bloc. We shouldn't say this is a Hezbollah government. Hezbollah nominated some ministers. But Hezbollah and its allies have a proportionately fair share of power in the cabinet, reflecting their fair share of power in society, both at the electoral and political power in society.

JZ: This doesn't mean they can sideline any decision they don't like.

RK: Only the major decisions have to be done by two thirds majority. If they decide to open peace talks with Israel, then you have to have a majority.

The main reason, they want to make sure that the government doesn't make a decision to disarm them. Being armed is key to their strategy, the government has to work by consensus which was always the case more or less.

JZ: Let's talk about the events of the last couple of days.

A prisoner exchange program, I kind of thought that, that the cover of the "New York Times" said it. The two pictures that were on the front of the times, one was the two bodies of the Israelis going back in the mourning, the parents and this was the picture of Quntar who was involved in a terrorist attack that killed a daughter and 4-year-old daughter, and another baby died in attack comes home a hero.

What was weird when you think about it is both sides got what they wanted, in the sense that Israel gets sympathy and compassion for the world, a victim of terror and Hezbollah gets a domestic victory as being the liberators.

But the P.R. consequences of that, for Lebanon, this doesn't look so good.

RK: Well, it is really a mixed situation.

But first I have to make an editorial correction, it is not the cover, it is the front page. Covers are what magazines do.

But it is a mixed picture. Many are proud of what they have achieved, and forcing exchange of prisoners. So at one level, there's a sense that Hezbollah is able to force Israel to do something it didn't want to do. But at the same time, Hezbollah is facing a lot more resistance in Lebanon, more and more Lebanese are speaking out criticizing it in a way they didn't do three or four or five years ago.

It is hemmed in, the Lebanese army and forces in the south of Lebanon, give them less maneuvering.

So Hezbollah has achieved a lot of successes in terms of their military resistance but there's less and less to do now and they have to shift over and shift into a more political mode.

Which is what they're doing.

They're not as experienced at politics as resistance.

JZ: They're riding high but are constrained.

RK: So is Israel, Israel is a powerful country and what it learned in the summer of 2006, is all of its power does not scare people like Hezbollah or other Arabs, like Hamas and others, being that Hezbollah and Hamas are not only willing to fight but are proficient at doing it.

So everybody is learning about their military power, as well as the U.S.A.

JZ: I wanted to talk about the U.S. in this whole dynamic, this leads us into it. There's an interesting set of developments taking place for -- for a number of years now. Since the Bush Administration got into its "we don't talk to them" mode. The effort to isolate Iran, isolate Syria, isolate Hamas.

And here we are today, making a prisoner exchange with Hezbollah and negotiating an exchange with Hamas, talking to Syria through the intermediary role of turkey and France as well and Iran sitting in a meeting with a U.S. official negotiating new terms for their -- their agreement to suspend their nuclear program.

Those in the Middle East suspect a conspiracy, America couldn't bungle it that badly.

Now they're on the defensive but what is it did Iran and Syria win this round, did the U.S. lose, is there a sense of a different strategy, have the tables turned.

There's a entirely new dynamic taking place here, very different than what we've seen play out several years ago.

JZ: There's a whole new dynamic and it is based on what I think is the single most important political development in the Middle East, not just the Arab world, the whole Middle East, including Iran and turkey, the single most important development of the last generation which is -- is the determination of large numbers of people, probably 200 or 300 million people who are no longer silent and passive.

They're for the going to sit around and watching their country being occupied and do nothing about it. You've got lots and lots of people who have taken their fate into their own hands.

It is represented by Islamist movements resistance movements, all kinds of signs that people are not going to sit around and acquiesce in their own marginalization.

That process has generated a lot of people that fight back against Israel and the U.S. and against autocratic regimes, whatever they feel. Whoever they feel is the problem. They fight back and what has happened is with the Iranians, and you got a draw now.

It is not a question of the Americans losing. It is not accurate to say the U.S. is lost. Maybe in specific areas like supporting Lebanon and Palestine, they didn't achieve what they wanted. Clearly that's the case, but what has happened, you have a draw now. You have a large number of people that are resisting and challenging the U.S. and Israel and Arab regimes and large number of people fighting the other way. They fought each other militarily and socially and every way, they realize they're pretty evenly matched.

What you have is a stalemate and a lot of smart people in the Middle East, Arabs, Israelis, Iranians, they're not stupid people. They're smart, they see it as a stalemate, they know it. So they're coming to terms, with the realities of their own region in a way that the people in the United States or in Washington require two or three years longer to do. So I think that is what is happening.

JZ: Let me get you out there in the conversation, if you have a question you want to ask Rami, the numbers are...

JZ: You mentioned the U.S. approach not working with guys we tried to strengthen and ended up not. What happens to them? Are they the victims of this?

Do they, I have to think that when, if I'm Abu Mazen and I took a moderate approach and engaged in those talks and I hoped coming out of Annapolis there would be benefits to this, and I got none, checkpoints not removed, prisoners not given up, but then I see, Hamas getting the exchange and Hezbollah getting the exchange and the truce being negotiated but Hamas now sits there saying, you guys have to watch because we have accomplished something you couldn't accomplish, that has to be terribly demoralizing for these guy who is I personally, I confess, feel more comfortable with as -- as leaders but they're -- they didn't fare so well.

RK: They haven't fared well, the problem with them, I supported the Palestinian view, but they proved incompetent and they proved to have thin legitimacy, they did not consult large numbers of Palestinians, they completely ignored the whole refugee part, they had bad politics as well as mediocre diplomacy, they didn't do a good job with the power and opportunity they have.

That's why they have limited impact right now. Hamas has become stronger. Other groups have become stronger.

The only solution for the Palestinians is to get back to a national unity government. With Hamas, and Fatah and other group that is there.

The Palestinian people as a whole, including Hamas are very reasonable in terms of a peace or coexistence with Israel, but it has to be equal and fair terms.

The way Hamas is different than Fatah, is they have been able to take a position, a tough position, including military resistance to occupation but they basically said, we're not subjected to double standards, like Arafat was for many years.

We're not playing the game that the Americans and Israelis and Europeans want us to play.

JZ: But they did.

Not to get into an argument here.

When this was going on, Hamas was sabotaging it every step of the way, with terrorist attacks that would set things back. And -- one of the reasons Arafat didn't get anything is because Israel was able to use these attacks as validation for stopping the process. That's what Netanyahu did repeatedly. Where has Hamas gotten.

They entered into the same cease-fire, they're demanding the same loyalty they did back in the 1990's, but the question is, is Gaza better than it was in the 1990's, are the Palestinians in a stronger position because of what Hamas has done.

They simply got the driver's seat but the car is still going nowhere.

RK: Well, I don't think that, I don't think that's fully accurate.

Gaza is in much worse situation, clearly Hamas has done bad things I don't like, you don't like, others don't like.

The main difference is, that they have been able to force Israel to do things by challenging them fighting them, resisting them, defying them, whatever.

They haven't played the game that Arafat played. They have been in the business for over 40 years. And this is why people have looked for other options.

What Hamas and Hezbollah have done is force Israel to play by rules that are acceptable by both sides. Cease-fires, et cetera, et cetera. That is one step, but it is an important psychological and political moment that tells Israelis and the Palestinians that first of all, they're prepared to negotiate.

Hezbollah and Israel exchanged prisoners and have to exchange rockets. It is better to have them agree on a cease-fire than on killing each other.

I think this is an important psychological and political moment, when Israel has recognized it, it may be able to achieve politically and diplomatically what it couldn't achieve militarily, with Hamas and Hezbollah and Syria and others.

The Israelis and Iranians are in a similar situation, where they had political and military combat and they fought each other and now they're looking at other possibilities.

This is a very rational approach.

JZ: The lines are lit up.

Let's go to Michigan first. Caller, your question?

Caller: Hello.

JZ: Yes.

Caller: I'm an American.

I was wondering this new development in the Middle East last few days, and the last seven years. They're talking to the Iranian representative, what does that mean for their life? Under the Islamic republic and also, what kinds, what kind of effect is it going to have on the election in the United States?

JZ: Okay. Thank you.

JZ: Does it impact the debate here, where you have Obama saying you should do this and McCain in effect not.

What impact does it have on Iran on the life there in the Islamic republic? Will it help foster change or set change back?

RK: I think the mere fact of talking won't have any major impact in either place.

We have to see what the results of the negotiations or the interactions are because they're not really negotiations yet.

The symbolism is powerful, for both sides, for the Iranians and Americans to make this positive noises and to sort of play diplomatic footsy with each other is positive, which means they're prepared to do a diplomatic dance, rather than to may nuclear brinkmanship.

The impact would be significant in the long run. The Iranians will need time to change their political system. Most Iranians are not happy with the kind of government they have. But most Iranians are helpless to do anything about it.

It is like the Soviet Union in many ways. It took them a long time to change their system. The same will happen with Iran but they need time.

JZ: Let's go to Jordan.

Caller?

Caller: Hi. I enjoy the program very much. Thanks to both of you. I have a quick comment and question.

My comment basically was, with the, with the issue of -- of if something happened between the U.S.A. and then -- and Iran, it seems like if Iran can give the U.S. anything, especially --and the Bush address, it can give it, a free hand in Iraq and basically, the prize, the prize that, that the U.S. needs in the Middle East, especially the Bush Administration being there, is basically access to the oil reserves.

So this is my comment.

My question is different from the comment, do you see the U.S. troops withdrawing from Iraq ever?

And the reason --

JZ: Thank you, good question.

RK: The U.S. troops have to withdraw from Iraq and I think they have to start it relatively soon.

You may have an agreement with the U.S. and a truly sovereign Iraq.

We don't have a sovereign Iraq, but you can have an agreement, that lets forces be about in smaller numbers, but that's some years down the road.

The American military presence in Iraq is a huge impediment to a stabilization of Iraq and to more of a political processes in the Middle East, in which the U.S. wants to be.

JZ: First, the question was interesting in the role that Iran is playing in Iraq, to some degree part of the success of the surge has to do with the fact that Iran has been helping a bit, instead of hurting a bit.

They played many sides against each other. But some of the strongest allies in Iraq right now are actually in the lead.

RK: Well, Iran has been doing this in Iraq for approximately many years. This is not a normal thing. Everybody has been doing this. The Saudis and Turks are there. There's way too much emphasis in this country on the Iranian role.

The United States has been spooked several times by Iran and Islamist movements and terrorist movements. They're all different, they overthrow the shah. And they see it as one general movement and the use is overreacting and confuse religion with nationalism.

The Iranians will always work to maintain their interest and influence, but they could never be controlling the Middle East.

They're Iranian, they're not Arab.

People in the Arab world respect them, they like them, ordinary people.

Arab governments don't like -- don't like what the Iranians are doing.

But they don't want them to rule them.

What they're looking for is strategic relationships, rather than control.

JZ: Let's take a couple of calls, because we got a bunch of folks backed up.

Pennsylvania, you go first.

Caller: Thank you so much.

We're very pleased to see the exchange of prisoners with, with Israel and -- and wonder, sense, since there are connections in Syria, why there hasn't been an effort by Hezbollah to exchange prisoners and get the detainees in Syria to, to be able to be released and come home to Lebanon, especially including the priest who was arrested and detained.

JZ: Good question.

Let's go to Pennsylvania for another call.

Caller?

Your question?

Caller: I'm a Vietnam veteran and I see history repeat itself many times.

I see many discussions about, about Iraq.

Iran.

And the Sunnis and everything.

If we pull out and I hope we do, completely as we did in Vietnam, is it going to be hopefully yes with a long answer, would this greatly benefit more peace, let them figure out and settle their own differences within themselves.

But take the first one.

JZ: Prisoners in Syria.

RK: Syria and Hezbollah are very close strategic allies, Hezbollah is not going to raise an issue that is going to be embarrassing for the Syrians, but there are Syrians who are a Lebanese group, they have to work in the context of the Lebanese national interest.

I think you'll see new dynamics and Hezbollah will soon have to come to a face-to-face with reckoning because the Syrians and Americans are negotiating.

This puts Hezbollah in a difficult situation, where they can be isolated from their two closest allies.

They'll start making adjustments quickly.

The second question, the answer is basically yes.

If the U.S. gets out of Iraq and in an orderly dignified manner it will be a major positive factor to the stability, of Iraq and issues around the region as well.

The withdrawal of the United States has to be orderly and systematic, but it must be clearly stated that the withdrawal is starting and I think you'll see this will have very positive impact everywhere.

JZ: Two calls from Texas.

Caller, your question?

Caller: I'm wondering what is the definition of a terrorist, everything that Hezbollah and Hamas does to Israel is called a terrorist attack, but what -- but what Israel does to them, they're just a strike. They come in at midnight and make a strike on a home, the whole house and that's not terrorist, terrorism?

JZ: Thank you for that call.

RK: I think there's a pretty clear agreement that terrorism is the use of violence against civilians for a political purpose.

The reality is that terrorism can be done by individuals, can be done by groups and by states.

So I think it is a good question and everybody in the Middle East has used terrorist style tactics and sometimes the terror is deliberate, sometimes it is less deliberate, but people, use it, regularly and everybody has used it.

But it is more important to keep in mind, that it is a very emotional term and has legal implications but everybody including the American and British governments, Iran, groups, everybody is using political violence as a routine means of political expression.

And this is one of the big problems in the Middle East now.

That violence has become so chronic and widespread and not just the occasional bomb but Army's and threats and attacks and occupation, but the rampant dominance of political violence as means of political expression --

JZ: And the slaughter that we've seen in Iraq.

It is just, terrible.

RK: Iraq, Palestine, Sudan, everywhere.

This is one of the reasons why you've got suddenly, suddenly over the last six months a lot of people in the Middle East, trying to, explore political alternatives.

As I said, there's a stalemate, they can keep fighting forever. It is not going to solve anything.

JZ: Thank you, thank you.

I'm going to talk next to G.O.P. strategist Rich Galen and we'll talk about the party platforms the coming year.

James Zogby: Welcome back to "Viewpoint."

Every four years the Democratic and Republican parties write their platforms. Where they stand. They're normally written by party leaders with input from the campaigns and key interest groups.

This year, however, the Obama campaign and the Republican Party are experimenting with a novel approach to let all Americans have the input into the writing process.

No political experience required. Here's all you need to do. Just go to one of the websites on your screen, if you're a Republican the G.O.P. site has an online platform.

JZ: I encourage you to take advantage of this unique opportunity for your voice to get heard.

Host a platform meeting, participate on a discussion on issue that is are important to you.

After you do, I appreciate hearing from you, e-mail me your thoughts on the platforms, your experience in contributing to them. You'll find my contact information on the website.

Speaking of getting involved, my next guest is someone that played an active role in politics.

Rich Galen is a strategist who served under Dan Quayle and worked for Newt Gingrich.

He's a former Director of the Republican Political Action Committee and served as senior advisor for Thompson's presidential campaign.

He's the author of a conservative blog and serves as assistant to Kay Bailey Hutchison, who is sometimes talked about as a Vice Presidential running mate for John McCain.

Let me start with this.

What is your sense of John McCain's Vice Presidential field? There are those that said he needed somebody young. I don't think so, makes him look old.

Rich Galen: Exactly.

JZ: They say he needs a conservative, but the question is, does that help or hurt?

What, what is the contour of the field as you see it right now?

RG: It is a great question.

Let me start by saying that eight years ago when George, then governor, George Bush was thinking about a running mate before the Republican National Convention, there was a short list, you could have a short list that went from here to Iowa.

And Dick Cheney's name would not be on it.

Nobody's going to know the answer to this.

Given the way the Vice Presidency has expanded its portfolio, since Al Gore and then through Dick Cheney, it is no longer just having somebody that can go -- now you got to have somebody that can do the work.

Then you add the other things, do they get along?

Does it help in a geographic way or demographic way?

I think, I think for McCain, if I had to bet a quarter, I would pick, I would say he's going to pick either Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts and former republican candidate for president or Tom Ridge, former homeland security secretary but more importantly, does he have a problem with the religious right?

RG: Sure.

But it is diverted, both do.

Because Romney is a Mormon, I think there's a sense that, that the religious right with Romney is willing to overlook that.

There'll be people especially in the south, the Deep South that will vote for him.

But they probably wouldn't vote for McCain anyway.

JZ: Because of the weather and traffic we only have you here for a short time but I want you to come back.

I want to ask one quick question, with Maliki saying we need a timetable and Petraeus says we need to shift troops, and I need troops in Afghanistan.

How does that impact McCain's approach to Iraq, does it undercut his position?

RG: No it does the opposite.

Rumsfield has been resistant to more troops, and when they did bring in more troops, everything was seen over the last six or eight months began to happen.

That may be a happy coincidence, but it shows we're getting to a point where even as your previous guest said, we can begin withdrawing troops in an orderly fashion that doesn't allow people that would prefer not to come pouring in, to come pouring in because the Iraqis now have a new self-identification, and they're, they're much closer to being able to defend themselves particularly -- protect themselves and have the society they want.

JZ: Thank you for joining us.

Even for a short time.

I want you back before we get to the end of the summer.

My guests, see you next week on "Viewpoint."