'TRAFFIC' AS DISCUSSED ON 'POLITICALLY CORRECT'

Bill: Okay. All right. Let's meet our panel. A former social worker and
youth counselor, he's now a seasoned veteran of two dozen films, including
the acclaimed "Traffic" in theaters everywhere -- Mr. Luis Guzman. Luis? [
Cheers and applause ] Hey.

Luis: Hey, Bill.

Bill: Sorry they killed ya in "Oz." [ Sustained applause ]

He is a Republican Party strategist and his radio talk show is on WNAL in
Washington, D.C. -- Mr. Jack Burkman! Jack? [ Cheers and applause ]

Jack: Hey, Bill.

Bill: Jack with the long tie. How are ya, sir?

Jack: Nice to see ya.

Bill: She is a VJ, a DJ and the rowdy half of "The Future With Ahmet and
Kennedy" on comedyworld.com -- Kennedy! [ Cheers and applause ]

Look what happened. Wow! Quite a 'do.

Kennedy: Wow.

Bill: He is the Golden Globe-winning and Emmy-nominated actor from "The Rat
Pack," "Devil In a Blue Dress" and "Boogie Nights." He works surveillance
in "Traffic" with Mr. Guzman -- Don Cheadle is right over there! [ Cheers
and applause ]

Don, good to have you back here, brother. Okay. All right.

(snip)

(FILM CLIP FROM TRAFFIC HERE)

God, I guarantee you bring 100,000 black people into your neighborhood, in
the [ bleep ] Indian Hills, and they're asking every white person they see,
"You got any drugs? You know where I can score some drugs?" Within a day,
everyone would be selling. Your friends, their kids. Here's why -- it's an
unbeatable market for us, man.

[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: Okay, that's --

[ Applause ]

I know that kinda came out of nowhere, but that is a clip from the movie
that you guys are in, called "Traffic," which is in theaters now.

Don: You could've shown one of our clips, but that's all right.

[ Laughter ]

Bill: Yeah. Actually, they make it rather difficult to show the clips you
wanted. I would've loved to show one of your clips.

Luis: I was waiting.

Bill: Take that up with the powers that be.

[ Cheers and applause ]

The bureaucracy in television is only slightly below that in the drug war
itself.

[ Light laughter ]

But the point of that clip -- I think what they're trying to say there is
that the problem is in demand and not supply. And the reason why -- I mean,
I think that is the message of the movie, of "Traffic," is that we are
fighting this drug war -- nobody wants to see drugs in the hands of kids.
Nobody wants to see drug abuse. But we are fighting it all the wrong way.

Don: Well, I think that, you know, with far-too-blunt an instrument to
really deal with what's going on. And I think it's obvious. You just look
at the fact that it's not working. It's clear that it's not working.

Jack: But the question is, why? I mean, it's a great movie with two of the
best actors I've seen in a long time, but it's --

Bill: Oh, kiss-ass.

[ Applause ]

Really.

Jack: I mean that sincerely.

Bill: A little kiss-ass.

Jack: It's Hollywood --

[ Laughter ]

Thank you, buddy. Thank you. Thank you very much.

[ Cheers and applause ]

It's Hollywood --

[ Applause ]

Bill, that movie was --

Bill: When are you gonna see that again -- a black guy giving a
conservative Republican money? [ Laughter ]

[ Applause ]

Jack: That's a gift.

[ Talking over one other ]

Kennedy: I wanna hear how he ties this to "Air Force One" and the Clintons.

Jack: That movie --

Bill: "And they stole a candlestick holder!"

Jack: Theft of Federal property is not joke.

Luis: It shows why drugs --

Bill: Go ahead.

Jack: That movie is Hollywood's warped vision that they're trying to impose
on America. It's Michael Douglas' way -- when I saw the movie, I thought of
"Tokyo Rose."

Bill: It's not Hollywood.

Jack: They're trying to undermine public confidence --

Kennedy: Actors don't write the movies.

Don: Actually, I did write this film.

[ Laughter ]

Kennedy: Okay, but I'll you something, Bill, if you'll allow me. Just for a
second. Please. Drug laws are racist --

Jack: Oh, that's silly.

Kennedy: -- They are outdated -- it is not silly at all.

[ Talking over one other ]

Don: Now, you know that's true. Don't even attempt to debate that.

Kennedy: Opium was outlawed because Chinese men were bringing white women
to their ruin in San Francisco.

Bill: Right.

Kennedy: Cocaine was outlawed because black men were thought to have
superhuman powers and they were thought to be raping white women. And
marijuana was outlawed in 1937

Jack: All of this is off the point.

Kennedy: It's not off the point.

[ Talking over one other ]

Kennedy: Drug laws are racist. They are outdated. They are un-American.
They are destructive.

Jack: Un-American.

Kennedy: And the war on drugs is a very expensive elephant that is doing
nothing but demoralize and separate this country.

Jack: It is failing because --

[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: And she's a conservative. And Kennedy is a conservative. And you know
what? She's not the only conservative that feels that way.

Kennedy: That's absolutely right.

Bill: Your hero William F. Buckley feels that way.

Jack: Is it failing because we're doing too much or doing too little?

Bill: Too little.

Jack: I say because we're doing too little.

[ Talking over one other ]

Don: Too much of the wrong thing.

Kennedy: That's it. Our priorities are so skewed in this war.

Jack: The issue is not the demand side, it's the supply side. The issue is
the supply side.

[ Talking over one other ]

Jack: Let me tell you something.

Luis: Well, where do you suggest they start?

Jack: You start with the military. The reason --

[ Talking over one other ]

Luis: You can't send in G.I. Joe to deliver the drugs.

[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: What?

Luis: You can't send in G.I. Joe. I mean, look at what happened in Vietnam.
Everybody got addicted to -- what was that drug, morphine?

Bill: Heroin.

[ Talking over one other ]

Kennedy: Peyote buttons?

Jack: The movie makes the point -- NAFTA. The borders are open. It's
inevitable. We have to accept it. But what we're really saying is it's
about money. We want trade to flow. We're not gonna prioritize this. I hope
the new President will prioritize this. There's a lot you can do with the
military.

Luis: Every President has prioritized the drug problem for the last 30
years. And guess what? We still got a drug problem.

Jack: That's the problem. Mr. Clinton has not prioritized it.

Luis: We still got a drug problem.

Kennedy: Earlier on in the election -- and this is a point that was
surprisingly overlooked by most of the media -- George W. Bush said we are
putting way too much money fighting a drug war and way too little money
into treatment, which is where the problem really exists is that --

Jack: Here's the problem.

[ Cheers and applause ]

You cannot have half of this hemisphere, you cannot have countries in South
America, countries in Central America, living off this drug money. The
United States government has got to lay down the law.

Kennedy: Yes, they do.

[ Talking over one other ]

Kennedy: And repeal drug laws. And that way, the U.S. will not have such
demand for South American drugs.

Jack: When the U.S. Navy, on the president's orders, intercepts and sinks
ships with drugs, when planes get shot down, nobody wants to die. And when
that happens --

[ Talking over one other ]

Luis: You know what I don't understand?

Don: They're not scared of dying.

Luis: I don't understand this. You know, you can send in the greatest
military in the world into Iraq, but you can't put the same effort into
drugs in your own backyard.

Jack: You can, it's just we haven't done it.

Luis: No, it hasn't been done.

[ Applause ]

Why not?

Jack: You've got both. Let me tell you something.

[ Applause ]

Why is it --

Kennedy: You're telling me that you would, instead of fighting the drug
war, you would put more and more millions of dollars bombing cement
factories in Bogota?

Bill: Why is it? [ Talking over one other ]

Kennedy: What is that doing for eighth graders --

Bill: Wait a second. The point that that clip was making was that kid is
telling Michael Douglas, who plays the drug czar, is that market forces
will always prevail. I would think, as a Republican, you, of all people,
would understand that. That market forces -- that the price of cocaine and
heroin -- William F. Buckley makes this point -- is $2. After the drug war,
it's $1,000 on the street.

Jack: Bill, let me tell you something.

Bill: Anything with a mark-up like that is going to find it's way to
market. I don't care if you have the greatest army in the world.

Jack: We can put a robot on Mars.

Bill: No, we can't.

Jack: We can send telescopes outside the solar systems.

Luis: Can't put a robot on Mars. The robot broke.

Bill: Yeah. The robot broke. We can't perfect Star Wars. My can opener
doesn't work. And the electric car was supposed to be perfected this year.
So we can't.

Kennedy: Why not forget the drug war and give the money back to the
American people and the families who deserve it and allow them to educate
their own children in the first place.

Jack: So what will you do with the supply? The supply will increase. If you
do what you wanna do and William F. Buckley wants to do and he wants to do
- -- if you decriminalize it, if you legalize it, you're gonna have RJ
Reynolds, you're gonna have tobacco companies that --

Don: They're selling drugs anyway! [ Talking over one other ]

Don: They're selling drugs anyway! [ Applause ]

Bill: Yeah.

Don: Cigarettes aren't drugs?

Kennedy: It's called Eli Lilly, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson --

Don: Nicotine isn't a drug? Caffeine's not a drug? Alcohol --

Jack: They're not as bad as cocaine and heroin.

Kennedy: I beg to differ!

Don: How many people die from marijuana? [ Talking over one other ]

Kennedy: When's the last time you got a good high off Nyquil?

Luis: How many people die from alcoholism?

Jack: You've got so many --

Bill: Wait a second. Answer that. How many people die from alcoholism?

Kennedy: Alcohol-related traffic accidents.

Bill: Do it after this commercial.

Announcer: Join us tomorrow when our guests will be -- host of "Temptation
Island" Mark Walberg, from "BET tonight" Tavis Smiley, and conservative
activist Erin Shannon.

[ Applause ]

Bill: And reacting to power problems, George Bush said he is moving boldly
on his energy plan, which includes drilling in protected areas of the
Arctic wildlife refuge and granting waivers to older plants to run at full
capacity even though it means violating clean air standards. All part of
his promise to bring back honor, integrity and emphysema.

[ Applause ]

Okay. Now as we were breaking, you were asking the question about liquor,
which is the fundamental question -- one of them -- in the drug war that I
have never, ever gotten a decent answer for. And the question is simple.
How can you justify demonizing one mood-altering substance while protecting
and profiting from others? [ Applause ]

Jack: Two wrongs don't make a right. And just because you've got -

Kennedy: Well, neither did prohibition.

Jack: Well, just because you've got cigarettes and alcohol that are
tragically embedded in our culture, that doesn't mean we as a society have
to go off and look for new evils so we can kill more children.

Luis: Whoa, whoa, whoa. But you're not talking about doing anything about
these two evils, either.

Don: Exactly.

Jack: Well, we're trying, but the ship has, unfortunately, sailed there.

[ Talking over one other ]

Luis: No, but you're so right, "We're trying."

Don: The ship is sailing on the raft of billions of dollars --

Luis: "We're trying." You know? They're never gonna solve the drug problem.
We're gonna come back here 30 years from now, we're gonna talk the same things.

Jack: Let me tell you what I think is leadership and what I think's been
lacking for eight years. You know, Barry McCaffrey, Clinton's drug czar, he
had a contest --

[ Scattered boos ]

[ Applause ]

I agree. They had a contest. They had a contest a couple years ago, I found
out from some inside sources. And the deal was, the kid who writes the best
essay about why drugs are bad --

Don: Gets to be the drug czar.

Jack: No, no.

[ Laughter ]

[ Applause ]

Jack: He gets to come - you'll like this -

Bill: Good ol' Haley Joel Osment is our next drug czar.

Jack: The kid gets to come -

Kennedy: "I see syringes!"

Jack: You'll like this. The kid gets to come to the set of a certain sitcom
- - I won't name the sitcom. So what happened? The office of the drug czar
found out that three or four of the actors were drug involved. So they
scuttled it. They shoved it under the rug. Let me tell you what leadership
is and the bully pulpit is. If the president had gone on national
television, highlighted these actors and said, "Look at these bums. Don't
become like them." That's presidential leadership.

Bill: You know what? If everyone in America who used a drug is a bum, it's
everyone in America. Because then you're talking about cigarettes,
caffeine, Prozac --

Kennedy: Viagra.

[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: Alcohol.

Kennedy: Okay, fine. Grandma can be addicted to Valium and Percocet, but
because if sonny Jim is shooting heroin, all of a sudden, he's a bad guy.

Luis: He won't come to my sitcom. I'll tell you that right now.

Bill: Bums, yeah.

Jack: We can argue the mechanics of controlled substance for years. We
could sit here for years -

Bill: Yeah, but you'll never give the answer to that question. How come you
protect some drugs and not others? How come some people wind up on the
wrong side of the divide in jail and others go home and have their Scotch?
That's another point they make in the movie.

[ Cheers and applause ]

Jack: The system is not perfect, but that's not an argument.

Bill: What do you mean, "Not perfect"?

Luis: Don't hit him, Bill! Don't hit him!

Don: Easy.

[ Talking over one other ]

Kennedy: But you know what?

Jack: Let me respond to his question.

Kennedy: The wheels are falling off your wagon because it's going to be
Republicans, believe it or not, that are going to reform these drug laws.
You have Democrats like Dianne Feinstein like, "Oh, we need to spend
billions more dollars on drug." Well, it's not working. You have to change
the marketing. You have to change demand.

[ Talking over one other ]

Jack: You have to interdict the supply.

Luis: Look, they failed a long time ago.

Jack: You have tell the country --

Kennedy: That hasn't worked!

Bill: Do you know what the definition of insanity is? It's repeating the
same action over and over after it's been shown to fail.

Jack: Let me tell you something.

[ Cheers and applause ]

We have to lay down the law.

Luis: Look, you gotta go back to the roots, you know. Nowadays, it's like
you do need more afterschool programs for kids. Kids don't have nowhere to
go. You know? [ Applause ]

You need people like ourselves in entertainment, people in sports, to be
good role models.

Don: Do you know else never comes up, which is interesting to me? That all
these countries that you're talking about where the drugs are pouring from
and you wanna stop the interdiction, these countries in the past have
suffered hugely under American policies. That's why they have no products
to sell but drugs half of the time.

Jack: You make a good point, but we're dealing with the here and now.

[ Talking over one other ]

Don: No, that is here and now. It is a continuum. You can't just start now
and go, "This is now." It's a continuum.

Jack: Your point is a good one. The demand side is very important. You need
all of those things. But you cannot forget the supply side. While you're
doing all the demand stuff, fine. Pursue it, do it. But you also have to
stop drugs from coming in.

Luis: Yeah, but if a kid has something to look forward to, he's not gonna
make that choice.

Bill: Yes!

Luis: You understand? It's like, oh, you know what?

Bill: The drugs have never stopped --

Luis: There's nowhere to go.

Bill: - One kid from getting one drug.

Jack: That's not true. That's not true.

Bill: Okay, one. You're right. I have to take a break. We'll be right back.

[ Applause ]

[ Cheers and applause ]

Bill: Okay. You guys play drug busters in this movie, cocaine. All I have
to say is if cocaine gave someone an erection instead of took it away, not
only would it be legal, Jack, but Bob Dole would be doing ads for it.

[ Laughter ]

(end of transcript)