CQ Transcriptswire

SPEAKERS: CHRIS WALLACE, HOST

DR. RICHARD BESSER, ACTING DIRECTOR, CDC

SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY JANET NAPOLITANO

SECRETARY OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES KATHLEEN SEBELIUS

SEN. RICHARD J. DURBIN, D-ILL., SENATE MAJORITY WHIP

SEN. JOHN ENSIGN, R-NEV.

JUAN WILLIAMS, FOX NEWS

MARA LIASSON, FOX NEWS

BRIT HUME, FOX NEWS

BILL KRISTOL, FOX NEWS

[*] WALLACE: I’m Chris Wallace, and this is “FOX News Sunday.”

Swine flu -- how serious is the outbreak? And what’s being done to contain it? We’ll get the latest from the nation’s top health officials, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano , Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius , and Acting Director of the Centers for Disease Control Dr. Richard Besser.

Then, Senator Specter switches parties. What does it mean for the president’s agenda and the GOP? We’ll get answers from two Senate leaders, Democrat Dick Durbin and Republican John Ensign .

Plus, Supreme Court Justice David Souter plans to retire. We’ll ask our Sunday group what happens to the balance of power on the court.

And our Power Player of the Week -- a son remembers his iconic father and mother, all right now on “FOX News Sunday.”

And hello again from Fox News in Washington. First, some sad news from overnight. Jack Kemp, the former football star who later became a key figure in the Reagan revolution, leading the charge for sweeping tax cuts, has died at the age of 73 after a tough battle with cancer.

He was a member of Congress, served in the Bush 41 cabinet and was Bob Dole’s running mate in 1996. We’ll have much more on his life later in the program.

But first, where do we stand with swine flu? Joining us now, the top three officials charged with protecting our country -- Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano , Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius , and Dr. Richard Besser, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control.

And welcome to all of you.

Dr. Besser, give us an update. What’s the latest on the swine flu, on the spread and the severity of the disease?

BESSER: Thanks, Chris. You know, as we’ve been saying for days, this is a rapidly evolving situation. There’s a lot of uncertainty. Each day we’re learning tremendous amounts of information.

What we’re seeing here in the United States -- we have 160 confirmed cases in 21 states. And as we say those numbers, they’re immediately wrong, because there’s work going on in every state to look for more cases.

We’re hearing from unaffected states, or previously undiagnosed states, this they’re seeing cases. The World Health Organization has reported this morning 15 countries with confirmed cases.

WALLACE: We have learned in the last couple of days more about the virus, and we are learning that it lacks some of the properties that made earlier flus so lethal.

We also are learning that perhaps the lethality of the Mexican strain may have been overstated. Does that mean we’re out of the woods?

BESSER: It does not. It’s encouraging information. You know, when we get a new strain of flu, we’ll look for what are called known virulence factors. These are things that in the past have been associated with severe disease.

And as we’ve looked for those, we haven’t seen the known ones associated with H1N1, and we don’t see the one that was associated with 1918. But every strain is new, and so there could be factors that we’re unaware of that we would need to look for in this strain.

WALLACE: So we’re not out of the woods.

BESSER: We’re not out of the woods. The information that we’ve been getting over the past couple days is encouraging.

WALLACE: Secretary Sebelius, Vice President Biden stirred up quite a storm this week when he told the advice that he said that he had given to his family. Let’s watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: I would tell members of my family, and I have, I wouldn’t go anywhere in confined places now. It’s not that it’s going to Mexico. It’s your in a confined aircraft. When one person sneezes, it goes all the way through the aircraft. That’s me.

I would not be at this point, if I -- it they had another way of transportation, suggesting they ride the subway.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Secretary Sebelius, is any of that true?

SEBELIUS: Well, I think, Chris, what’s important is that a travel advisory has been issued for American travelers who are voluntarily going to Mexico, not mandatory trips, but pleasure trips. And we’ve asked people to discourage travelers from taking those trips right now until we know more, as Dr. Besser said. I think that other kinds of travel -- if you’re sick, it’s a good idea not to expose others to that sickness. But certainly, airplane travel, train travel -- my whole family’s been here this weekend. My elderly father and aunt will be on a plane this morning. My son and his fiancee will be on a train back to Boston. I’m flying to Atlanta on Monday.

So traveling and being in closed places is certainly something we encourage people to continue to do.

WALLACE: So I mean, I have to tell you, some people have said to me since Vice President Biden talked, maybe you guys are telling the public one thing, but at the highest levels of government you’ve heard something else, and that -- no, you’re saying to me that everything that Vice President Biden said about -- I’m not talking about travel to Mexico -- being in a confined space, being in a classroom, being in a school, being in a subway -- no health danger to any of that?

SEBELIUS: Well, what -- again, with -- we’re letting the science lead this investigation and trying to be prudent about situations.

We’ve asked schools to close if there is a confirmed case, because what we’re seeing in New York and other areas is this is transmitted very easily. Children are great carriers of viruses -- and to separate those children until we know more about this situation.

So there is some specific health advisory, but it certainly is not don’t get on a plane, don’t get on a train, don’t get on a subway. And as I say, in my own family, we’ve got lots of travelers today and we’re continuing to do that.

WALLACE: So why would the vice president tell his family that? Are we to believe that the vice president of the United States is a crackpot?

SEBELIUS: I think that each member of our country makes decisions about themselves and their family and about safety and security. What we’re telling you is what the science says.

WALLACE: Secretary Napolitano, you testified before Congress this week, and I want to explore the difference between what you’re telling the public and what some very smart people, like Senators McCain and Lieberman, asked you.

First question: Why not close the border with Mexico?

NAPOLITANO: Well, again, we take our lead from science, from the epidemiologists, because we want to lean into this. We want to do the right thing. But we don’t want to react in a way that’s not going to actually help contain the spread of the flu.

And what the scientists tell us unanimously is that closing the border in this circumstance doesn’t make any sense, because this flu already has spread. It’s in a number of countries now. And I think you also have to understand the inordinate cost associated with closing a border, the number of jobs associated with that, the trade that goes back and forth.

If it had a benefit to it, you would -- you would make that calculation perhaps a little differently, but when the scientists are uniform in saying that’s not going to help you contain the flu, we’re going to focus our efforts on what we can do to contain the flu...

WALLACE: But -- but...

NAPOLITANO: ... and that’s on mitigation here.

WALLACE: ... but Secretary -- and again, this is a question a lot of people have been asking me -- isn’t that like saying if you have one mosquito in your house that’s carrying a disease, you shouldn’t close the door, because there’s one mosquito there and, you know, why close the door and get -- and keep any other mosquitoes out?

Aren’t you better off with fewer mosquitoes carrying disease?

NAPOLITANO: This isn’t about mosquitoes. This is about the flu, and the way that...

WALLACE: Well, I understand. But we’re talking about people who are carrying the flu.

NAPOLITANO: Exactly. But the way the flu is transmitted -- and I’ll let Dr. Besser take this on as well, because we’ve answered this question a lot this week, and we’ve thought about it a lot.

But again, the flu is here. It’s a virus. The way it is transmitted, closing the border in and of itself is not going to help or slow how it’s going to spread around our country.

What will help -- what will help is -- are the containment strategies. So if you’re sick, don’t go into a contained place. By the way, the vice president did take the train home from work yesterday, so I think that, you know, he himself would say if you’re sick, don’t get into a contained place. If you have a child who’s sick, don’t send the child to school.

Those are the strategies that will ultimately help us contain the virus.

WALLACE: Why isn’t -- Secretary Napolitano, why isn’t the U.S. taking some of the same precautions that other countries are, like setting up thermal cameras at checkpoints to check for travelers who may have fevers?

Other countries are canceling all flights between them and Mexico and back.

NAPOLITANO: Well, again, because we think we’re making the right judgments for the safety of the American people. If we thought that would actually help, we would do it. But the advice is it -- not only will it not help, but again, it will divert efforts and costs and everything else away from things that will help, and that’s what we’re focused on.

WALLACE: Dr. Besser, because we’re getting kind of a mixed message here, are we overreacting to this outbreak? Are the government and the media guilty of hyping this?

BESSER: We are not overreacting to this outbreak. With a new infectious disease, there’s a lot of unknown, a lot of uncertainty. And you basically get one shot. You get one chance to try and reduce the impact on people’s health.

And so what you do is you take a very aggressive approach. And as you learn more information, you can tailor your response.

I would like to address the border issue, because I think that there’s a lot of misunderstanding about that. As we planned for an outbreak or a pandemic of flu around bird flu, the idea that if this started on distant shores, increasing screening at the border might give us, at best, a couple weeks to do some of the things that you need to do to prepare.

Once it’s entered your borders, flu is a very easily transmittable virus. And in fact, some people have no symptoms at the time that they’re able to transmit. And so the efforts at a border at that point are really not going to help you in your outbreak and could be directed much better in ways that will improve the health of your communities.

WALLACE: I want to talk about the question of overreaction, though, Doctor. The city of Fort Worth shut down its entire school system -- 147 schools, 80,000 students -- because one kid had a confirmed case of swine flu. Is that an overreaction?

BESSER: You know, what you’ll see with any outbreak, and in a setting of uncertainty, is guidance that comes down, but you’re going to see application of that in different ways in different places.

And what we’ll learn from that moving forward is what were the most effective measures in this -- for this particular virus in this country. And as we go forward, that will help guide what things we recommend people do in the future.

WALLACE: Well, that’s a bureaucratic answer -- doesn’t answer my question. Is it an overreaction? Is there any sensible public health reason to shut down 147 schools when one kid in one school has the swine flu?

BESSER: If it turned out -- and thankfully that’s not the case. If it turned out that this virus had some of those factors we were talking about, I think we would be looking at that school district and saying, “Wow, weren’t they proactive? They were forward-thinking. That was a great thing to do.”

As we learn these things about the virus, transmission in communities and severity, we’ll be able to say whether that was necessary or whether that was more than would be required to control it in their community.

WALLACE: But I think, Secretary Sebelius, one of the things that confuses people is that there seems to be an apparent disconnect here.

For example, while all of you talk about the possible, the potential, danger here, as I understand it, the government has no plans to develop a swine flu vaccine until -- until you finish the completion of the vaccine for next fall’s regular swine -- regular seasonal outbreak.

Why -- which is more of a threat, the swine flu now or next season’s regular seasonal outbreak?

SEBELIUS: Well, first of all, Chris, I think both are going on simultaneously. The scientists have identified a strain, a virus strain, that’s being tested and grown as we speak.

What hasn’t been determined yet -- and it will be determined by the scientists -- is whether or not vaccine production for H1N1 makes sense, whether we really do want to do full-scale production.

What we know is seasonal flu, year in and year out, affects millions of Americans. About 200,000 people end up in the hospital and 36,000 people die. That’s what happens every year with seasonal flu.

So production of that vaccine is critical to making sure that we don’t have increased deaths associated with seasonal flu.

And one of the things that we know is that even if this current situation seems to be lessening, if we are cautiously optimistic, we really don’t know what’s going to happen when real flu season hits with H1N1 virus.

So aggressive activity is going to continue, the testing and production, oversight of the FDA, and we are going to be ready to go with a vaccine. It makes it even more important with a new flu strain that we do both simultaneously.

WALLACE: But you aren’t doing both simultaneously. You’re manufacturing the regular flu. You’re not manufacturing the swine flu.

SEBELIUS: Well, Chris, it’s too early to manufacture anything. What they need to do right now with this H1N1 virus is to test it, is to make sure they’ve got the right antidote to this particular viral strain, to make sure we have the right dosage, and then make a decision based on the science of what we know whether or not full- scale vaccine production -- you can’t make a vaccine unless you know what’s in the virus and what’s going to...

WALLACE: Did you say -- and I don’t want to misquote you. Did you say you’re cautiously optimistic on the swine flu? SEBELIUS: Well, what Dr. Besser and I -- again, I’d like to pivot back to the scientists. What I think is being determined is that the lethality, which initially presented itself as part of the Mexican situation -- the deaths of a real -- an age group that you don’t typically see in flu season -- is not seeming to present itself.

But, Dr. Besser, maybe you can clarify where...

BESSER: I mean, we’re seeing encouraging signs and -- you know, I want to put that in perspective, though. As the secretary was saying, the seasonal flu, something that hits us every year -- we see 36,000 deaths.

Here, we’re seeing encouraging signs that this virus so far is not looking more severe than a strain that we would see during seasonal flu. And so I still expect that this will have significant impact on people’s health, but so far the signs are that it is not more severe than what we’ve seen in a seasonal flu.

WALLACE: Secretary Napolitano, a lightning round -- quick questions, quick answers on practical questions. A Harvard School of Public Health study found that 25 percent of people said they’re staying out of malls. Sensible or not necessary?

NAPOLITANO: Well, if you’re sick or you feel sick, stay out of the mall.

WALLACE: No, no. I’m talking about healthy people.

NAPOLITANO: No. I mean, you should consider your normal daily activities, unless you’re sick or have someone in your household who is sick. Then you should contain yourself.

WALLACE: Eight percent of people say they’re wearing masks.

NAPOLITANO: Again -- again -- depends on the individual circumstance, if you have a particular illness underlying that. But again, common sense -- you don’t need to wear a mask.

WALLACE: And if you’re healthy, is there anything in terms of your normal daily living that you shouldn’t be doing?

NAPOLITANO: Well, what you should be doing is covering your mouth when you cough. What you should be doing is washing your hands regularly and thoroughly.

What you should be doing is being very situationally aware, meaning if you or anybody in your household appears to be coming down with the flu, stay home. Don’t go to the mall. Don’t go to other places where you could infect somebody else.

WALLACE: And finally, Secretary Napolitano, as the former -- we have to pivot here -- as the former attorney general of Arizona, your name has been put on the, quote, list as a possible replacement for David Souter on the Supreme Court. Any interest in that job, if offered? NAPOLITANO: You know, Chris, I’ve got to tell you, I’ve got my hands full with the flu right now, and I’m just going to stick with that.

WALLACE: Well, that’s a -- that’s a non-answer.

NAPOLITANO: That’s all you’re going to get.

WALLACE: You wouldn’t accept the job of Supreme Court justice?

NAPOLITANO: Listen, I think the president has many, many excellent choices before him, and that’s his choice to make.

WALLACE: Secretary Napolitano, Secretary Sebelius, Dr. Besser, we want to thank you all for coming in and answering a lot of questions that I know are on people’s minds. Thank you.

SEBELIUS: Thank you, Chris.

WALLACE: Up next, two Senate leaders about an opening on the Supreme Court and that big defection from Senate Republicans. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WALLACE: Even before it was officially announced, the political sparring began over who President Obama will name to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter.

For insights, we bring in two Senate leaders -- Democrat Dick Durbin, who joins us from his home state of Illinois, and Republican John Ensign , who’s in his home state of Nevada.

Senator Ensign, given the fact that Justice Souter was a reliably liberal vote on the court, and that replacing him isn’t going to shift the balance of power, is this a free choice for President Obama, no Republican filibuster?

ENSIGN: Well, what I would like to see the president do as far as the choice is concerned is, you know, first of all, you have to have somebody who is honest, somebody who is qualified, and there are plenty of people out there who fit that bill.

But also, I would like to make sure that there are no litmus tests as far as, you know, this particular issue -- abortion -- whatever those kinds of issues that are out there. If people have actually taken positions, I think that that in and of itself prejudices them in the future.

And so what I want to see is the bench get back to not legislating. They’re not part of the legislative branch. They need to get back to just interpreting the law, interpreting what our founders meant in the constitution.

And ultimately, too many times lately, they point to international law instead of the U.S. Constitution as far as what the basis for their decisions are. And we need to get back to what the Supreme Court is supposed to be about, and that is interpreting our Constitution according to how our founders meant it and according to judicial precedent.

WALLACE: Senator Durbin, with so much on his plate, should President Obama shy away from a fight on a Supreme Court nominee and pick someone who appeals across party lines? DURBIN: Well, there doesn’t have to be a fight. And I think what the president said when he spoke to Justice Souter is an indication of what he’s looking for.

He’s looking for someone who has the right legal credentials, someone who is honest and forthright and understands their responsibility on the Supreme Court.

I might disagree a little bit with my colleague, Senator Ensign -- hard to imagine someone, after 30 or 40 years of experience in the law, who hasn’t taken a position on some issue. That’s going to happen.

We just need to make certain that person is using sound reasoning to reach that position and that they’re fair in the way they approach it.

When I take a look at the names, even those from Illinois, they are extraordinary that may be considered for this. But I don’t have any inside information in terms of who it might be.

WALLACE: Let me ask you -- let’s follow up on that, Senator Durbin. The president talks about wanting somebody with empathy and understanding -- his words. Whatever happened to just applying the law?

DURBIN: Well, look what happens with Lilly Ledbetter. This led to a change in law because the Supreme Court under its new leadership decided to interpret the law in a way it had never been interpreted.

And as a result, a woman who had been discriminated against in the workplace for more than 10 years was denied any recourse in court. That was a reversal of previous analysis of the law.

And I think what I hear in President Obama’s statement is that he wants the justices of the court to try to understand the real world we live in and the impact of some of these decisions. Apply the law, but do it in a sensible fashion.

WALLACE: Senator Ensign?

ENSIGN: Well, as I mentioned before, interpreting the law versus making new law is what I think ultimately we should be looking for in somebody who’s going to sit at the highest level of our justice system.

Too many times, people on the Supreme Court and even in the Court of Appeals -- they have been making laws based on what they want to see in the Constitution, not on what the Constitution says.

And that’s what we have to get back to, is actually having people who look at the law and they read it for its plain reading. They read it -- what the founders intended. They read it for what judicial precedent has been, instead of just what they want to see in the law.

Our courts have been turning the legislative branch at the state level as well as at the federal level upside-down because too many of them actually want to become legislators instead of just justices.

WALLACE: Gentlemen, let’s turn to Arlen Specter , who, as you all too well know, switched parties this week.

Senator Ensign, with a Democratic president, with control of the House and, it looks like, pretty soon filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, fair to say the Democrats have no excuses, that they now own whatever goes right and whatever goes wrong?

ENSIGN: Well, certainly, with the ability to override the minority in both the House and the Senate -- and when you have a president who can sign the bills, they’re going to have a lot of responsibility on their plate. I hope that they don’t try to reach too far.

I hope that this attitude that President Obama has talked about, this bipartisanship of sitting down at the table -- for instance, on health care, we have a very important piece of legislation.

We’ve never considered something this big in the United States, that affects one-sixth of the economy, that affects every American. This needs to be done in a bipartisan fashion. If the Democrats want to, they could certainly ramrod through bills now. But I hope that they don’t do that.

I hope, actually, what President Obama talked about, this bipartisanship -- that it actually will come to reality. We haven’t seen a lot of it this year, but I hope that we can start seeing some of that.

WALLACE: Senator Durbin, if you end up with 60 votes, how much of the Obama agenda do you think you will get through this year? And please be specific.

DURBIN: Well, first, let me tell you, to reach 60 votes, keep in mind that Senator John Cornyn , the head of the Senate Republican Campaign Committee, said if it takes years, they are going to try to stop another senator from being seated in Minnesota regardless of what the Minnesota courts say. So assuming 60 votes may not be the proper premise.

But let me also tell you this. As a person who counts votes, we have a very diverse caucus on the Democratic side -- some conservatives, some moderates, some liberals -- and each of them sees things a little differently. To think that they’re going to march in lockstep may be Harry Reid and my dream but not likely to occur.

What can we do this year? I want to see a bipartisan bill on health care. I want to us attack this issue of global warming and climate change, and to make sure that America is moving towards energy independence, green jobs in this new economy. Those are things we can accomplish.

WALLACE: Senator Durbin, just to quickly follow up before I move on to another subject, are you suggesting that the Republican Party is going to block the decision in the Minnesota Senate race between Norm Coleman and Al Franken to keep you from getting a 60-vote majority?

DURBIN: Senator John Cornyn has already announced that, that he wants to see this appealed to the federal courts and beyond, if necessary and, I think in his own words, said even if it takes years.

To think the people of Minnesota would be denied a Senate seat, even after they’ve had two official recounts, and it’s gone through the courts, would really be unfortunate.

WALLACE: Senator Ensign, I want to put up some numbers about the state of the GOP. In 2004, you had 55 Republican senators. Now you have 40. In the nine northeastern states, including Pennsylvania, there are now just three Republicans out of 18 senators, and 15 House members out of 83 seats.

Senator Ensign, it sounds like a Disney movie -- “Honey, I Shrunk the Party.”

ENSIGN: Well, certainly, the parties go through ups and downs, and especially in the northeast we have not done well in the last several years, and we have to address that as a party.

Both parties have diversity. What we have not done a good job in, and especially, I believe, in the northeast, is recruiting the kind of candidates who can win, and that’s what we have to do.

The Democrats have done a much better job of identifying people who they think could win in particular states, and I don’t think that we’ve done a really good job of that, and we need to get back to that.

Ronald Reagan had a great saying. Somebody who agrees with you 80 percent of the time, that’s your friend, not your enemy. And unfortunately, you know, in the Republican Party, some people have wanted to get almost -- to have too pure of a party.

You know, obviously, I’m a conservative, but some people have wanted to have just all conservatives in the party. But if you’re going to be a national party and you’re going to be in the majority in Washington, D.C., or in most states, you’re going to have to welcome people who maybe vote differently, who look at issues differently.

Certainly, people in the northeast have environmental issues that are completely different than those of us in the intermountain west. And you have to respect each other’s differences and each other’s not only regional differences, but sometimes philosophical differences.

Get back to the core issues, though, of personal responsibility, of limited government, of actually thinking about our children and our grandchildren, with this huge debt that is ballooning in the United States. I think this has really been a good wake-up call for the Republican Party.

WALLACE: Senator Ensign, briefly, from long and perhaps bitter experience, any advice for Senator Durbin about dealing with Arlen Specter ? ENSIGN: You know, good luck, because that’s all I can say, and I know as Republicans that we have some great candidates that we’re recruiting out there, and we want to make sure that Arlen Specter is no longer in the United States Senate after the next election. We’re going to work very hard to make sure that happens.

WALLACE: Gentlemen, I want to turn to something serious and ask you both about the passing of Jack Kemp last night.

Senator Durbin, you served with Kemp for six years in the House. Your thoughts.

DURBIN: Jack Kemp was a friend of mine, and although we disagreed on politics, I have to tell you he was a person who brought the same enthusiasm and energy to politics that he brought to football. And you could tell, whether it was a battle of ideas or a battle on the gridiron, Jack Kemp threw himself into it completely.

The fact that when he was the head of Housing and Urban Development, he became a person who reached across, tried to help many people in constituencies that Republicans don’t normally work with was an indication of how he thought his Republican Party should be much more inclusive.

I hope that Jack’s passing will be a lesson to the Republicans of today that their future should be more embracing and more inclusive.

WALLACE: Senator Ensign, we have less than a minute left. How important a figure was Jack Kemp in the Republican Party?

ENSIGN: Well, he was a great idea man and certainly was one of those Republicans who helped shape my thinking. He was one of the first people that I met with as far as political leaders when I first ran for Congress back in 1994.

And a lot of his ideas shaped a lot of our party with the Republican revolution and the whole Contract with America. He was a very important figure and really a great man and a great family man.

WALLACE: Gentlemen, we’re going to have to leave it there.

Senator Ensign, Senator Durbin, we want to thank you both. Thanks for joining us today.

DURBIN: Thank you.

ENSIGN: Thank you.

WALLACE: Coming up, our Sunday gang tackles that opening on the Supreme Court. Who will the president pick? And will Republicans fight it? Some answers in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: I view that quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people’s hopes and struggles as an essential ingredient for arriving at just decisions and outcomes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Well, that was President Obama Friday saying what he’s looking for in a replacement for retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter.

And it’s time now for our Sunday group -- radio talk show host Laura Ingraham -- welcome -- Mara Liasson of National Public Radio, Bill Kristol of The Weekly Standard, and Juan Williams, also from National Public Radio.

Well, Bill, President Obama talked about a record of excellence in what he’s looking for, but what do you think of empathy and understanding as criteria for picking a Supreme Court nominee?

KRISTOL: I guess he’s not going to pick me. I had my hopes up, but the empathy thing might just -- might damage me.

WALLACE: Dr. Scrooge.

KRISTOL: Thank you. Well, look. I think conservatives will complain that this means he wants results-oriented judges who aren’t simply going to follow the rule of law.

In my view, there’s some truth to that, but I suspect, frankly, the public doesn’t react adversely when a president says, “Well, we can have rule of law and empathy at the same time.” And I suspect he will pick a liberal activist judge, and he will probably get her -- I think I will be a her -- confirmed very easily.

WALLACE: I think it will be a her -- a Harvard graduate. I think it will be a she.

KRISTOL: Oh, sorry.

WALLACE: Mr. Williams?

WILLIAMS: Well, however you want to put it, he’s right. This is going to be a woman. I think that...

WALLACE: Why? Why is everybody saying that?

WILLIAMS: Well, because the thought was -- and the whole -- the whole set of preparations at the White House even before there was a White House was to replace Justice Ginsberg.

And so the emphasis was on bringing a woman, either an additional woman in now or replacing Ginsberg. And so you’re going to see people like Sonia Sotomayor of the Second Circuit, possibly, or you’re going to see someone like Elena Kagan, who’s now the solicitor general.

You could even go to political people like -- you asked former Governor Napolitano, but also think about someone like Jennifer Granholm, the governor of Michigan.

And the idea is there that you bring in people who are sort of outside the normal judge/lawyer context, someone who, as President Obama said, has a sense of understanding of people who are the outsiders in America life, people who are vulnerable.

President Obama mentioned a teenage mom, but he’s also talking about minorities and, of course, in this context, bringing in a Hispanic at this point, being the president who appoints the first Hispanic to the court -- that would make President Obama even more historic than he already is.

WALLACE: Laura, it’s interesting, because, you know, we have this list of favorites that circles Washington. None of us have any idea...

INGRAHAM: Right.

WALLACE: ... who’s really on the White House short list.

But at the top of the non-known list of -- or unknowing list of favorites is this Sonia Sotomayor, who is an appeals court judge originally appointed by Bush 41. And as Juan points out, not only would she be a second woman for this court, she’d also be the first Hispanic ever on the court. What do you know about her?

INGRAHAM: Well, look, Judge Sotomayor is known by litigants before the court. She’s been described as judicially liberal, which means you don’t favor the principle of judicial restraint.

And she’s also described as something of a bully, someone who is tough on litigants before the court. And I don’t think that matters. I mean, if she’s tough on people who come before the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, who cares?

I think what conservatives have to be careful about here is just saying, “Oh, well, President Obama -- he is going to have the votes, and so it’s a done deal, and it’s done.”

Well, maybe that’s the case, but when we have the president of the United States out there on Friday saying that it’s going to be about empathy and understanding people from different walks of life, that is a singularly loopy idea for a qualification for a justice.

Supreme Court’s role is clearly defined in the Constitution. We have a separation of powers. We have a legislative branch. And as Dick Durbin pointed out, the Lilly Ledbetter Act was passed by Congress and signed into law by the president.

That was not from some judicial fiat. I don’t know why he cited that in his conversation with you. It would have been nice if Senator Ensign actually said the argument -- the case that you cited actually cuts against your argument for judicial activism.

So she’s a traditional liberal and does not believe in, I think, a strict adherence to separation of powers. And you know, will she get picked? Who knows?

WALLACE: Let me just ask you, before we bring in Mara, I mean, is there anybody of the list -- as I say, the list -- that we don’t know whether it really is what the White House is thinking about or not -- that you think could pass muster and might be somebody Obama would pick that might be a little more middle of the road?

INGRAHAM: Well, I think there are people who are in the line of more of a Byron White-Felix Frankfurter type judicial liberal, if you want to use that phrase, someone who believes in judicial restraint but while a liberal.

Someone like a Jose Cabranes, also on the Second Circuit -- he’s sparred with Judge Sotomayor several times on key cases, including that recent firefighter case that just got to the Supreme Court, the Ricci case. He is interesting.

WALLACE: Just real quickly, that was a case about -- that white firefighters did...

INGRAHAM: Yes.

WALLACE: ... very well on a test and they ended up throwing out the test.

INGRAHAM: Right, whites and one Hispanic actually challenged the -- what was done there.

But -- interesting. Jose Cabranes is a Democrat appointed by Bill Clinton, but, you know, he’s a -- he’s a traditional liberal. He believes in separation of powers. I think that would be interesting. I don’t think Obama would pick him.

WALLACE: Mara, it’s been suggested that even though they’re not going to have the votes and not be able to block it, that Republicans will make a big fuss because this is the kind of thing that can mobilize support, get some money and help rebuild the party.

LIASSON: Well, there’s no doubt that the outside groups -- and there’s a world out there that cares very much about judicial nominations. Most of the country doesn’t. But they’re already mobilizing, and they’re already sending out e-mails and getting ready for the big fight to come, whatever parameters it might take depending on who he nominates.

But yes, I think that court fights generally have the opportunity to reactivate the bases of both parties.

But you know, there was something else that Obama said when he came into the briefing room on Friday. He said he wanted someone who understood that justice wasn’t some abstract legal theory or footnote in a case, meaning, I think, that he wants someone who has some real- world experience.

A lot of the people on the court today have either practiced corporate law or been on the appeals court. It’s a very -- it’s removed from people who’ve had a variety of life experience, whether they’ve held elective office, whether they’ve worked as a prosecutor.

WALLACE: So do you have a name?

LIASSON: Well, Sonia Sotomayor did work as a prosecutor for many years with Morgenthau in New York. I mean, that’s something. Jennifer Granholm, of course, who is an elected official -- although I don’t consider her on the top of the list, knowing nothing about the list.

But yeah, somebody who’s actually had some real-world experience other than corporate law.

WALLACE: Let me switch to something else which seems like old news now, Bill, but, in fact, it only happened a few days ago, and that is Arlen Specter switching from the Republican Party to the Democratic Party, with Democrats now just a Minnesota supreme court decision away perhaps, although Dick Durbin thinks they might take it to the federal court, from getting a 60-vote filibuster-proof majority.

What does this mean for the Obama agenda?

KRISTOL: Short-term, it’s helpful. I think medium- and long- term it’s a problem, because now it’s Obama’s -- it’s the Democrats’ Congress. It’s Obama’s country, so to speak.

Economic policy, national security policy -- can’t complain anymore about Republican obstructionism. Now the stories are going to be whether he can hold the Democrats together, not whether Republicans are blocking him, because they can’t really block him.

And I do think he now is unambiguously in charge. This week was a big week in that respect -- the 100 days, you know, press fawning over Obama, the Specter switch of parties, and the Supreme Court nomination. It really just -- and the fact that I guess the Senate passed his budget on Wednesday, the auto bailout.

If you put it all together, it’s -- you know, this is now becoming, more quickly than I would have expected, not Obama inheriting a tough set of circumstances from George W. Bush and trying to work his way out of it. I think pretty soon it’s Obama’s country, and he will be judged whether the economy comes back, and whether his national security policies are sensible and prudent and the like.

WILLIAMS: Well, it was a great week for President Obama, no about it. And Specter’s switch, I think, suggests how much this has become a Democratically ruled city -- the Capitol now, with Obama’s popularity, Democratic control of both the House and the Senate.

Really, he has a clear road for getting through not only his next -- his first Supreme Court nominee, but also getting through things like health care legislation that’s so important to his agenda.

But I think Bill’s spinning unbelievably when he says, you know, it’s good news for Republicans. People in this town want power, and Obama has power here and he’s going to exercise it tremendously.

And when it comes back to the notion of that Supreme Court, you know, all the Republicans can do is hope to delay. And so what they’re going to do is they’re going to bring up wedge issues -- you know, things like abortion, school prayer -- and try to make this -- and to try to start to talk about people who are interventionist judges, people who are radical judges.

INGRAHAM: Oh, yeah. I love how...

WILLIAMS: These are not radical judges. Let’s look at what President Obama...

WALLACE: Wait, wait, wait. Let somebody...

WILLIAMS: No, let me finish.

(CROSSTALK)

WILLIAMS: President Obama said this week 95 percent of the time...

WALLACE: I guess he is filibustering.

WILLIAMS: I am. Ninety-five percent of the time, he said, we’re going to go with the Constitution, but the last 5 percent, you’ve got to look at someone’s heart. And I don’t think that’s...

(CROSSTALK)

INGRAHAM: ... Oprah is the official nominee of this Supreme Court, then. I mean, this is...

WILLIAMS: Oh, stop.

INGRAHAM: ... this is silly.

Look, there are -- a lot of moderate Republicans out there are giving advice, saying, you know, “OK, the party needs to move to the middle, we need to embrace these new ideas,” and -- OK, interesting debate.

The question is how did the Democrats gain power in recent years, by going to the middle? Democrats gained power by going to the most liberal senator in the U.S. Senate and they ran him for the presidency and they won.

They were relentlessly attacking George Bush for several years from the left. They didn’t move to the middle. And the idea that Republicans now have to move to the middle what -- beyond John McCain ’s middle -- I don’t know -- is ridiculous.

The Republican Party has to grow the party with new ideas and effective communication, and I haven’t seen a lot of that lately.

WALLACE: We have to take a break here. But when we return, we’ll remember football star, Congressman and one of the fathers of Reaganomics, Jack Kemp. Back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WALLACE: On this day in 2006, a jury decided Al Qaida terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui should be sentenced to life. Moussaoui is the only person ever convicted of playing a role in the 9/11 attacks.

Stay tuned for more from our panel and our Power Player of the Week.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JACK KEMP: Every time this country in the 20th century has cut tax rates across the board, revenues went up. The economy grew.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: That was Jack Kemp in 1996 discussing his economic philosophy during a vice presidential debate with Al Gore.

And we’re back now with Laura, Mara, Bill and Juan.

Well, I’m sure we all have Jack Kemp stories, and my most memorable story comes from 1980 from the Republican convention in Detroit that nominated Ronald Reagan and Jack Kemp and a young protege of his, a young Michigan Congressman named David stockman.

I met him in a bar. We sat there over drinks. And almost like a preacher, a messianic preacher, Jack Kemp was talking about -- take a 30 percent cut in taxes, which sounded just crazy, and he had a -- you know, a cocktail napkin, and he was marking it all up, and for hours talking about how this was, one, going to happen and, two, how great it was going to be.

He was an astonishing figure.

Your thoughts, Mara?

LIASSON: Well, he was a real happy warrior, there’s no doubt about that. But also, I think that his passing is extremely, you know, timely because here we are the midst of this debate in the Republican Party about what they do to grow again and to become a majority again, and I think that Jack Kemp is a real inspiration for what you can argue they need to do.

I mean, he was for a big tent Republican Party. He was for conservative principles, but for the purposes of developing small businesses, developing minority businesses. He was the intellectual father of enterprise zones. He was for all those...

WALLACE: Which was the idea that you create special...

LIASSON: Of tax cuts inside...

WALLACE: ... tax breaks in the inner city.

LIASSON: ... inner-city urban neighborhoods. And I think that if anybody exemplified how you marry conservative principles to a kind of egalitarian or populist kind of vision, it was him.

KRISTOL: You know, it’s funny that you mention that, because the last time I spoke with Jack on the phone, he called me sort of out of the blue, and we hadn’t been in that much touch recently.

I had spoken to the House Republicans retreat and said -- given -- talked about how they had to be for new ideas, and you could be at once conservative but also a sort of happy warrior and bold, and advance bold and interesting new ideas with good cheer and make them convincing, and I cited Jack Kemp’s success in the late ‘70s.

I mean, I think the period of Kemp’s importance from 1977 to 1980, during the Carter presidency, as you mentioned, and taking something that was widely derided by the establishment, that the Republican leadership was hostile to, and making it -- convincing President Reagan and many others that this could be the key not just to economic policy, but to a sort of optimistic, forward-looking Republican Party policy -- Kemp’s achievement in those years was crucial.

So I went into that a little bit in speaking to these House Republicans, most of whom were so young, they were, you know, God knows, in grade school then, and I didn’t think much of it, and I went back.

And then Monday -- I guess someone had reported this to Jack, and he was already sick and sort of somewhat, you know, at home, and he called me and said he really appreciated my praising him. And I said I didn’t really -- I wasn’t doing it to praise him.

You know, I really thought his was an important example and really an historic achievement, and I -- and I think that’s very much the case.

WALLACE: Juan, talk -- I mean, I think one of the things that was -- that really set Kemp apart from a lot of other Republicans was outreach, and he -- that he talked constantly about we can’t be the party of the country club, we can’t be the party of Wall Street, we have to be the party of the little guy and the party of the inner city.

WILLIAMS: It really was true that he had a special relationship with black America. I mean, he was very comfortable for a Republican. Gosh.

But I think, in part, it came from the fact that he was a football player, and so he had lots of black teammates and had a special relationship there. And so you saw black people come forward who were former teammates to campaign for him.

You know, my favorite Jack Kemp story is I remember writing a magazine piece about him in the midst of the ‘88 campaign, and he was in Mississippi at the Neshoba County Fair, and he was throwing these beautiful spirals to these barefoot Mississippi kids.

You know, he -- I mean, and he’s in a shirt and tie, and he’s got the tie collar there. You know, it was perfect. But Jack’s right hand was busted up by a lineman early in his career in the AFL, and the doctor said, “Your finger is --” this is his middle finger on his throwing hand -- “is going to have to be fused.” And he said, “OK.”

And he put his hand around a football so it was fused so that the hand fit the football so he could -- again, even in his old age, long after time, throw these perfect spirals.

But in terms of the politics of Jack Kemp, let me say Jack Kemp should have run for the Senate. He should have taken on Jacob Javitz. He should have gone up -- you know, Alfonse D’Amato got that seat. He should have beaten Mario Cuomo for governor of New York.

He didn’t take those big steps but in some ways thought that he was the legitimate heir to Ronald Reagan, that it wasn’t George W. Bush , it wasn’t Bob Dole, but he could never convince the mainstream of the Republican Party of that because he was a guy who was for minorities, unions, the big tent that Mara spoke about.

INGRAHAM: For all of us who went to college in the 1980s, who were young Reaganites and went on to work in the Reagan administration, Jack Kemp was a seminal figure. He certainly was an optimistic, forward looking force.

He also didn’t shy away from controversy. He understood that there were a lot of people in the Republican Party who, you know, didn’t really much care for his going into the inner city and making these emotional appeals for conservativism.

I mean, let’s not forget, his controversial stance at the time was, as you said, 30 percent cutting taxes. You’ve got to be kidding me. He didn’t -- he wasn’t deterred, and he wouldn’t be deterred now seeing what the odds are against the Republican Party.

He’d say, “Look, this is what politics is. It’s up and down. Make the case to the people. Educate young people in the values of conservatism, and do it with a smile on your face.” That was his great -- that was his great role, and he had a profound effect on me at Dartmouth.

His son Jeff was a quarterback at Dartmouth along with Shula, and they were, you know, a big force in college, and he was there on the sidelines cheering them on. It was great.

KRISTOL: You know, just thinking about -- Juan called him a football player, which reminds me of a story. Joanne Kemp, his wife, a wonderful woman, took one of the daughters, I think, to the Senate gallery, and Jack was giving a speech on economic policy.

Someone sitting behind them, not knowing who they were, said, “What does that guy know about economics? He’s a football -- he’s a football player.” And apparently -- I don’t know if it was Judith or Jennifer -- turned to the guy behind them and said, “My daddy wasn’t a football player. He was a quarterback.”

WILLIAMS: Absolutely.

KRISTOL: And he was -- he was a quarterback for us conservatives.

WALLACE: How important do you think he was in Reaganomics? I mean, how key a figure in everything that we associate with Reagan’s economic policy?

KRISTOL: Absolutely crucial. He got there first on supply-side economics, on his sense of focused pro-growth economics. He persuaded Ronald Reagan to adopt that. Reagan had not talked about that in the ‘76 campaign.

By 1980, Reagan ran as apostle of pro-growth economics, not simply balancing the budget and austerity. It was absolutely decisive to the victory in ‘80 and to the Republican Party for the next 25 years.

WALLACE: And the final thing I want you to say, Bill -- and we have less than a minute left -- you were saying to me earlier in my office that as a young Republican, sort of like Laura was saying, in the Reagan administration, that he was much more accessible and somebody that you could -- you felt you could have some contact with as opposed to Ronald Reagan, who was on this huge pedestal.

KRISTOL: Right. I mean, for me in the ‘70s -- I’m older than Laura -- I mean, Kemp was sort of the -- was the leader in Washington of conservatives and combined -- and Laura was right about this -- an aggressive conservatism with a kind of happy Democratic populism that made it possible to think that conservatives could be a governing majority.

WALLACE: Well, we just want to say that our prayers go out to Jack Kemp’s wonderful wife, Joanne, to their four children, and to their 17 grandchildren. They have an awful lot to be proud of.

Thank you, panel. See you next week.

And don’t forget to check out the latest edition of Panel Plus, where our group here keeps arguing on our website, foxnews.com/fns, shortly after the show ends.

Up next, our Power Player of the Week.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WALLACE: When it comes to our Power Players of the Week, there are no second acts, at least until now. But when we learned a past honoree was up to something interesting, we had no choice but to make him again our Power Player of the Week.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BUCKLEY: When the universe hands you material like this, perhaps not writing it almost seems a kind of a conscious evasion.

WALLACE: Christopher Buckley is talking about a new book he’s written, “Losing Mum and Pup,” his account of the year in which both his remarkable parents, Pat and William F. Buckley, died. He dismisses talk of therapy, saying his reason for writing the book was much simpler.

BUCKLEY: It was a way of spending time with them, remembering them in their prime.

WALLACE: What a prime it was. Bill Buckley was the intellectual father of modern conservatism, a witty and elegant figure. Pat was a queen of New York society known for her beautiful clothes and her sometimes outlandish behavior.

Their son recounts all that, but also how it ended, starting at his mother’s deathbed.

BUCKLEY: I sat there holding her hand and I said -- and these words sort of just came out, “I forgive you.”

WALLACE: Forgive her for what?

BUCKLEY: Well, she could be, you know, impossible and -- in a -- in a -- in a sort of a grand way, and she could be hurtful.

WALLACE: Buckley tells how his mother fought with him and others, often making up stories to strengthen her case.

BUCKLEY: Mom was a complicated person, a grand person, a glorious person, but she could also be very naughty and impossible. She was -- you know, she was a drama queen.

WALLACE: After his mother died, Buckley took care of his dad, who he says was clearly a great man.

BUCKLEY: As a great man, he was sort of greatly complex. You know, he was the director of his own movie.

WALLACE: But that didn’t make life with father easy.

He walked out of your graduation from college a few minutes in?

BUCKLEY: Well, yeah. Yeah. He got bored.

WALLACE: And Chris Buckley describes his father’s final months in funny but sometimes painful detail.

It is a very loving book. But you write that some parts of it would appall your parents. You talk about the fact that by the end your father was popping pills, that he considered -- considered -- suicide. Any qualms about pulling back the curtain?

BUCKLEY: A memoir, Chris, I think has to be honest. As I say in the -- in the first chapter, part of becoming an orphan is it’s your call now. WALLACE: Some of his parents’ friends in New York aren’t happy about what he’s written. He dismisses that, but he doesn’t brush off a question about his decision last fall to back Barack Obama .

Do you think you would have done that if your father were still alive?

BUCKLEY: No, I absolutely would not have endorsed Barack Obama for president because -- because, you know -- because, you know, dad might have gotten mad.

WALLACE: How often do you think of your mum and pup?

BUCKLEY: Oh, I think of them every day. You know, these are interesting times, and I’d -- I would love to have pup’s take on what’s going on on Arlen Specter ’s defection, and so I reach for the phone, you know, every day. Every day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE: And that’s it for today. Have a great week, and we’ll see you next “FOX News Sunday.”

END