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SCOTT SIMON, host: Well, the end of the year 2000 debate between the vice presidential candidates. I'm Scott Simon in Washington.

To recap what we've heard this evening, the candidates both wore dark suits, though Mr. Cheney wore a blue shirt, and their demeanor was sober and mutually respectful. Senator Lieberman used all but 10 seconds of his time on the first question on the budget surplus projections to thank his home state and his family. Both candidates detailed, perhaps with too many details, competing tax proposals. Mr. Cheney repeated that the Republicans would return a quarter of the projected government surplus to taxpayers; Mr. Lieberman charged again that tax cuts would benefit only rich people. Mr. Cheney charged that Democratic spending plans would expand any surplus.

But Mr. Cheney, who has opposed abortion rights, sounded conciliatory tonight, saying he wanted to reach across the political divide on that issue. Joseph Lieberman tried to make those differences sharper, saying he supports abortion rights.

The candidates really agreed on foreign policy questions. They both want the Serbian opposition to depose Slobodan Milosevic. They support the imperiled Mideast peace process and Israel and they both oppose Saddam Hussein and would do so by any means necessary.

The candidates even substantially agreed on gay rights. There were some differences over energy policy. Cheney wants to increase domestic production, especially in Alaska; Mr. Lieberman opposes drilling there and said the answer lies with new technology. There was a slight exchange of repartee. Mr. Lieberman congratulated Mr. Cheney on the money he's made in business during the Democratic administration and Mr. Cheney said that he hoped to give his opponent the very same opportunity.

You are listening to live convention coverage of the vice presidential debate from NPR News.

NPR's Madeleine Brand is in the debate hall. Madeleine, are you there?

MADELEINE BRAND reporting: I am. Good evening.

SIMON: Hi. Good evening, and share with us what you could discern of the audience reaction there.

BRAND: Well, the audience is now finally making a few noises as they're moving outside the hall right now, but during that entire 90 minutes, barely a peep could be heard. No one was rustling any candy. No one was coughing. People were actually very attentive, sitting straight up and staring straight ahead at the debate. And it was pretty difficult to do that up where we are here, up in the rafters, because both of these men are fairly soft-spoken and it was difficult sometimes to catch everything that they were saying. But, yeah, people were paying attention. They weren't saying anything. They weren't laughing. They weren't clapping, but they were just listening.

SIMON: It was a debate that had a good many details and I think we can chance the observation, fewer platitudes than we often hear in debates.

BRAND: Yes, I think so. And what I was struck by was, first of all, many of the questions, at least at the beginning of the debate, echoed the questions that Jim Lehrer asked on Tuesday night. But the responses and the attitude seemed a lot different. There wasn't as much political posturing that I could perceive, and just sort of a more low-key, civilized, shall I say, approach to the issues and a lot more discussion and attention paid to the issues, particularly, as you said earlier, in foreign policy.

SIMON: Yeah. Well, let me draw you out a little bit more than that because there were some criticism in the first debate that foreign policy was really barely touched. That was not the case tonight.

BRAND: No, it wasn't. And there was the same question about Slobodan Milosevic. But also, they went into the Middle East and they talked about Iraq and they talked at length about what a military is for, military preparedness, what it means, should a military be used mainly to fight wars or should it be used to keep peace around the world. And that is a very important philosophical question that both candidates showed that they disagreed with and it's a question that really the American people need to think about, because we are becoming engaged in more and more situations around the world.

SIMON: And it must be said in this campaign year, just a couple of mentions of God and then nobody tried to claim him or her.

BRAND: Yes, exactly. And that was surprising. There was the mention during the gay question of whether gays should be afforded the same constitutional protections and Joe Lieberman mentioned that gays are also children of God. But I was also struck there where both of them agreed that they really hadn't made up their minds and maybe they were being political in that situation, but maybe it was actually true.

SIMON: OK. Thank you very much. NPR's Madeleine Brand in Danville, Kentucky.

The Lieberman Camp
Special Report/Interview: Doug Hattaway reviews the candidates' performances

SCOTT SIMON, host: We're going to turn now to the media center on the campus there in Danville, where we should be joined by Doug Hattaway, who is a spokesman for the Gore-Lieberman campaign.

Mr. Hattaway, are you there?

Mr. DOUG HATTAWAY (Spokesman, Gore-Lieberman Campaign): Yes, I'm here. Good to be with you.

SIMON: Thanks for being with us and please share with us your assessment of Dick Cheney's performance tonight.

Mr. HATTAWAY: Well, as you said, the debate really focused on the issues, which was a good thing. It's something we were hoping for because we believe that we've got the right positions on the issues. And Dick Cheney did as well as he could defending their positions on the issues. I thought he's certainly an accomplished debater. He's got a distinguished record as secretary of Defense and a longtime member of Congress, so he certainly did a good job explaining Governor Bush's positions on the issues. But at the end of the day, of course, I happen to believe that we win when the focus is on the issues because Al Gore and Joe Lieberman have got a plan that's gonna make sure our prosperity benefits everybody and not just a few.

SIMON: Mr. Hattaway, I'm sorry to interrupt you but this news is just crossing our wires. We have a bulletin from the Reuters News Service. Yugoslav--I'll read it exactly as we get it here. Yugoslav army chiefs meet in Belgrade; statement expected after session. That is from Tanjug, the official Serbian news agency which earlier today, we are led to believe from reports across the other side of Europe, was taken over by people who now proclaim themselves to be free Serbian journalists. If that session ends while we're on the air, we'll certainly let you know the outcome.

Mr. Hattaway, I took some time away from you. I'm sorry. Where did Mr. Cheney fall short in your assessment?

Mr. HATTAWAY: I think he fell short on a couple points. One, in the discussion on Social Security, he sort of glossed over the problems that Governor Bush's privatization plan would have. It's going to cost him $1 trillion to make the transition from the current Social Security system to a partially privatized one and they haven't figured out how to pay for that yet and he refused to rule out cuts in Social Security benefits. The thing is he can't have it both ways. They're gonna have to come up with $1 trillion to pay for their Social Security plan and we haven't heard where they're going to get that money from.

I guess another point is on this whole question of how we're going to use our prosperity--are we going to use the surplus to benefit everybody or just a few? And Joe laid out very clearly how their tax cut uses up most of the non-Social Security and non-Medicare budget surplus and won't really allow us to make the kind of investments that we need to make in national security, which was a big issue tonight, in education. I thought there was some--somewhat short-shrifted on education but at the end of the day, if you look at what the two sides are proposing, Al Gore's got a much broader approach. He starts with universal preschool, reforms classrooms, tax deduction up to $10,000 on college costs and even job training and lifelong skills learning for adults. Bush can't make that sort of commitment because he spends more of his resources on the tax cuts. I thought those were a couple points that--again, I think because their positions are wrong on the issues, he couldn't do very well.

SIMON: What do you make of the differences that Mr. Cheney found between the old Joe Lieberman and the new Joe Lieberman, the one who's running for vice president?

Mr. HATTAWAY: I think much ado about nothing on one hand. Al Gore wasn't looking for a yes man to be his vice president. He respects the differences on specific issues that he and Joe have. But I think, fundamentally, they're both what we call New Democrats. They both believe in the same fundamental values of fiscal responsibility, welfare reform, a strong national defense. They haven't agreed on every issue and that's OK. I think historically we've seen that when a presidential candidate and his running mate disagree, obviously, it's the presidential candidate's agenda that trumps and that's tradition, I think. You see the same thing on the other side. Dick Cheney was criticized pretty heartily when he was announced for votes against Head Start, for young children, for cop killer bullets and things like that. I'm not sure Governor Bush has embraced Dick Cheney's positions on those issues.

SIMON: You feel richly rewarded and ratified in this election of Joe Lieberman as Mr. Gore's running mate tonight?

Mr. HATTAWAY: Well, it really was a tremendous performance. I think it shows that it was a bold and smart pick on Al Gore's part. I think Joe's style came through very well. He showed himself to be presidential in his own right. He was very personable and warm, I thought very persuasive and confident. I think it did demonstrate once again that Al Gore made the right choice in his running mate.

SIMON: Did George W. Bush make a good choice in Mr. Cheney?

Mr. HATTAWAY: I think so. He certainly was looking for someone to add that level of experience to the ticket and Dick Cheney certainly brings that. I think it did represent initially that he was looking backward rather than forward, that Cheney came out of his father's administration and was talked about as sort of an old guard pick. But at the end of the day it's clear that he communicates well on behalf of George Bush. You know, the only problem they've got is that their plans don't really address the needs of middle-class families.

SIMON: Mr. Hattaway, thanks very much for being with us.

Mr. HATTAWAY: Thanks so much. Good to be here.

SIMON: Doug Hattaway of the Gore-Lieberman campaign.

The Cheney Camp
Special Report/Interview: Ari Fleischer reviews the candidates' performances

SCOTT SIMON, host: We now want to go to Ari Fleischer, who's senior communications adviser for the Bush-Cheney campaign. He joins us also from Danville.

Mr. Fleischer, thank you for being with us.

Mr. ARI FLEISCHER (Senior Communications Adviser, Bush-Cheney Campaign): Thank you for inviting me.

SIMON: And please give us your assessment of Joe Lieberman's performance tonight.

Mr. FLEISCHER: Well, I thought it was a good performance by the senator. I think the American people were particularly well served tonight. They got to watch the kind of debate that I think the public has been yearning for, a real healthy, lengthy discussion of the policies. I do have to say that I think there were some things that the senator did that I'm very grateful for. He did acknowledge that this administration has done `not enough,' in Senator Lieberman's words, on energy policy and he also made our case that you can indeed develop America's energy resources in an environmentally sensitive way, which is something that we have been saying, so I thank the senator for supporting our position on those issues.

SIMON: I'm wondering what your--the assessment you would make of the way--it seemed to be, I think, one of the most distinct differences between the two on energy policy. Mr. Lieberman pointed out that Dick Cheney had supported drilling in Alaska but didn't think it was a good idea in his own back yard.

Mr. FLEISCHER: Well, that came up and, as the secretary said, I don't think it was a question of his back yard. I think it's a question of environmental balance. Certainly no one has said there's no development of energy in Wyoming. Wyoming has plenty of energy development in that state. There's plenty of oil and gas being taken out of Wyoming. The governor and secretary's proposals for the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge is 8 percent of that refuge. That's a balanced energy policy and as, again, Senator Lieberman pointed out, we have the technology to develop our energy resources in an environmentally sensitive way. If we don't do it, we risk turning over America's economic future to big foreign oil and I think that would be a mistake for our nation.

SIMON: Mr. Fleischer, what do you make of the amity that the candidates had on--I'm going to name a couple of surprising issues tonight--gay rights? I couldn't tell the difference between them.

Mr. FLEISCHER: Well, I think Secretary Cheney made clear that that is, on a federal level, not something that we would support granting that, that the Defense of Marriage Act is in place and we support that. But we are respectful of states' rights to pass various initiatives even if we disagree with them.

SIMON: And this would include Vermont, right?

Mr. FLEISCHER: And as you noticed, the governor has always been consistent. States' initiatives are states' rights. I don't think you can be a consistent Republican if you go to Washington and say that I think we need to reduce the role of federal government, respect the rights of the states and then speak out selectively about those things that the states pass with which you disagree. If you're going to be for states' rights and allow a state referendum to proceed, you have to do so even with the ones you disagree with. So I thought you saw some very consistent principles from Secretary Cheney reinforcing what the governor has said.

SIMON: Well, let me ask this. I used the word `conciliatory' to characterize the way I thought Mr. Cheney sounded tonight talking about abortion rights. Would you agree with that characterization?

Mr. FLEISCHER: Well, I think there's a great sensitivity on the Republican side for how to bring people together to make abortion more rare. Abortion is one of the most emotionally sensitive issues in our society. There's plenty of room to divide and to vilify if we allow it to go that route. Instead, you have two people on the Republican ticket who want to figure who to bring people together around those issues where we can reach agreement, particularly abolishing partial-birth abortion, which you heard they would sign into law. So I was heartened by the tenor of all the debate tonight. I think you see two mature and serious politicians who had a healthy amount of respect for the political discourse.

SIMON: You were proud of Dick Cheney?

Mr. FLEISCHER: Yes, sir.

SIMON: And...

Mr. FLEISCHER: And Joe Lieberman. I thought Joe Lieberman also--the two of them participated, I thought, in a very straightforward, good policy-oriented debate. I did think, though, Secretary Cheney was more in command, that he dominated on the issues, particularly when it came to defense, foreign policy, on energy. I do think you saw Senator Lieberman quite on the defensive, particularly over defense.

SIMON: Mr. Fleischer, I want to thank you for all your time. And if I could ask you just to stand by for a moment, we want to come back to our audience with a bulletin that has crossed our wires from the Reuters News Service. I will read it to you as it appears on our wire. Yugoslav army chiefs meet in Belgrade; statement expected after session. If we are still on the air when any further news crosses, when that state session presumably breaks up, we will bring you that news immediately. We'll add as a codicil, Tanjug, which has been the official Yugoslav or Serbian state news agency, was earlier today, in their own assessment, taken over by people who declared themselves independent, free-minded Serbian journalists. So this is the source of that report that we're getting.

Mr. Fleischer, there was amity on foreign policy, wasn't there?

Mr. FLEISCHER: There was amity on foreign policy. That's an American tradition, but there remain differences and I think you heard those, too. I think what you had overall tonight were two politicians who treated each other well, treated each other with respect, but there are clear issue differences and you heard them on foreign policy; most pronounced on defense and whether or not our military is indeed as strong as it needs to be and whether we have cut back too far, whether morale is too low. The two clearly clashed on that issue.

SIMON: Mr. Fleischer, thanks very much.

Mr. FLEISCHER: Thank you.

SIMON: Ari Fleischer is the spokesman for the Bush-Cheney campaign.

Now if you missed parts of the debate or if there are simply sections that you heard and would like to hear again, you may visit our Web site at www.npr.org and follow the links to Election 2000, where you'll find audio from tonight's debate as well as the one earlier in the week between Mr. Bush and Mr. Gore.

Candidates' Performance
Special Report/Interview: Andy Kohut reviews the candidates' performances

SCOTT SIMON, host: Andy Kohut is in the studio with us tonight. He is the director of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press and he joins us in our studios in Washington, DC.

Andy, welcome back.

Mr. ANDY KOHUT (Director, Pew Research Center For The People And The Press): Glad to be here.

SIMON: No knockout, no decision?

Mr. KOHUT: Well, I don't think so. I think it was a relaxed, reasonable conversation. I think there's a lot less anxiety for those viewers who are backers of Governor Bush and backers of Vice President Gore. I mean, there's no concern about this one making a goof or there's no concern about whether one of them would go on too much. And they seemed reasonable. They seemed solid. They seemed like a couple of grownups with some real differences. It wasn't wildly exciting, but it was pretty good as these things go, if you're interested in looking at two people who might do a good job with a very big job. And...

SIMON: Well, let me put it just bluntly, did they do a better job of going over the issues than the candidates at the top of the ticket who we saw a couple nights ago?

Mr. KOHUT: Well, I think--in many ways, I think people might have been able to listen and hear more, because there was certainly a lot less strategic jargon. I mean, we didn't hear so much about working families and the middle class and all of that. There was some mention of that but it wasn't--it didn't seem nearly as programmed, maybe because of the kinds of men they are, maybe because this is the--you know, they're the second bananas and there's not as much riding here. But it was a little easier to take, I think, for the average voter, what would be a little more difficult--it was not very exciting. But if you stuck with it, I think the average person was probably a little less put off by some of the annoyances of the presidential debate. In fact, it's probably a good thing that this debate came after the first one because it might have shown up the presidential debate, just in my own view.

SIMON: If you were--I don't want to say an undecided or average voter, but if you were an interested voter watching or listening to the debate tonight, what would you cite as the two or three differences between the two major party candidates?

Mr. KOHUT: Well, I think one of the things that would come out of this is that the average undecided voter has probably heard a lot more about Joe Lieberman. He got a lot more press and Cheney was lost in this. And Cheney showed up pretty well and he handled the difficult question about the oil exploration that he favored in Alaska but didn't want in Wyoming pretty well and he did a pretty good job with some tough questions. And Lieberman is very good, too. And I think it wouldn't make me, as an undecided voter, have a clear choice but it might give me some assurance that, at the bottom of the ticket, there are two pretty good alternatives. It certainly seemed a lot less strident and even a little less ideological. I mean, you know, Cheney kept talking about freedom of choice and, you know, the typical Republican approach and Lieberman made his typical Democratic points, but it wasn't so sharply drawn, I don't think.

SIMON: Based on your knowledge of the American public and their attitudes and opinions, what do you make of the fact that--it would be--speaking as one observer, it would be difficult for me to tell you the actual policy distinctions between the two on two very emotional issues: both abortion rights and gay rights.

Mr. KOHUT: Yes, and that's because I think most recognize that there is a convergence in the middle. Moderation is the watchword of this election. Neither side wants to be seen as too extreme. Both want to be a bit conciliatory and they talk that way about abortion in particular. And they want to fuzz over some of the differences. You know, we didn't have third and fourth party candidates in any of these debates, who would have really given us an edge. And there's no desire to make these differences on issues where there's both a win-loss. I mean, for both parties there's a win-loss on abortion, pro-choice, pro-life, within the constituencies of both Gore and Bush.

SIMON: Andy, based on your experience again, what use can the respective major party campaigns make of this vice presidential debate tonight?

Mr. KOHUT: I hate to be frank but I think not much. I mean, that's the nature of vice presidential debates, even when they're bombs or something really goes haywire, as when it went haywire for Dan Quayle and Senator Bentsen made him look so bad. That didn't really affect Bush's lead over Dukakis. And certainly...

SIMON: Yeah, but we have to remember, Bentsen won the debate, lost the election.

Mr. KOHUT: Lost the election. Certainly this debate, which was, you know, pretty even and no one is going to come away with a worse attitude, they certainly did no harm, which is the absolute imperative for vice presidential candidates in situations like this.

SIMON: I'm going to mention once again for our listeners that there's a bulletin that's crossed the wires within the past few minutes. I will read it. It's coming out of--I assume, actually, it's coming out of--yes, Yugoslav army chiefs meet in Belgrade; statement expected after session. So if we, over the next few minutes, receive any word on what the result of that is--of course, there's been a great deal of curiosity about the position of the Yugoslav army is going to be. They have so far refused, near as we can tell, for at least about the past 12 hours, to come to the physical defense of Slobodan Milosevic, so, of course, there's wonder and speculation as to what position they're going to take now and whether or not this is some kind of signal that they are, in fact, abandoning Mr. Milosevic and recognizing the results of an election there. Please stay tuned to National Public Radio News because we, of course, will bring you that story.

Andy, thanks very much for joining us again.

Mr. KOHUT: You're quite welcome.

SIMON: Andy Kohut is director of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. I'm--forgive me; for the People and the Press.

Conclusion
Special Report/Analysis: Review of candidates' performances

SCOTT SIMON, host: To recap what we heard tonight on this evening's debate, Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut began by saying hi to his 85-year-old mother and promised to stay positive. Secretary Cheney promised to stay positive and said he would, therefore, not mention Senator Lieberman's singing. Senator Lieberman, therefore, promised not to sing. Mr. Lieberman said that he and Mr. Gore would set aside more of the projected surpluses to pay down the national debt. Mr. Cheney said the economy might turn down because not enough is being done for education and spending on education produced, quote, "almost no positive results." Senator Lieberman disagreed. He said average testing scores were up and that he and Mr. Gore would spend more on education than would a Bush-Cheney administration.

Secretary Cheney said taxes needed to be cut because total taxation at all levels is at the highest level it's been since World War II. The two men disagreed sharply on how best to apply tax cuts. Mr. Lieberman said that he and Al Gore would focus on the middle class in areas where they said they needed it: education costs, day-care costs. Mr. Cheney said this proposal was too complex to be helpful. He said, in fact, you needed to be a CPA to understand it and he thought it was better to give every US citizen a tax cut, period.

Both candidates said they supported equal pay for equal work between men and women. Dick Cheney said he would not revisit the FDA approval of the abortion drug RU-486 because it was the determination of safety and efficacy. Mr. Lieberman said he supported that decision and was pleased to see that unwanted pregnancies and especially teen pregnancies had declined in recent years, but Mr. Lieberman also spoke out in favor of teen-age abstinence.

The Republican's candidate that said American military forces would suffer in the next combat situation because they're underequipped and undertrained. Senator Lieberman said the current civilian and military leaders of the armed forces say it is the most dominant international force in the history of the world. They agreed on supporting the upou--forgive me, the ouster of Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrade. Of course, we note tonight that that ouster might be imminent, within the next few hours, if it's not already accomplished now. They both agreed on the need to return to peace talks in the Middle East and supported the state of Israel.

They differed, and perhaps this was the sharpest difference of the night, on the problem of high energy prices. Dick Cheney supporting greater domestic exploration for oil and development, including in the Alaskan Wildlife Refuge. Mr. Lieberman said that greater efficiency and conservation and new technology might accomplish as much without damaging the environment. Both candidates pledged to protect Social Security for generations, but they differed on whether the fund needed at least some private investment in order to achieve this. Mr. Bush--of course, George W. Bush, the Republican presidential candidate, has suggested investing as much as 5 percent of the Social Security fund in private sources.

When discussing the performance of the economy, Joseph Lieberman essentially kidded Dick Cheney about the money he'd been earning as chief operating officer of an oil services company. Mr. Cheney accepted his compliment and said that the government had nothing to do with it. Joseph Lieberman said that this repartee moved his wife to wonder perhaps if it wouldn't be time for him to be in the private sector and Dick Cheney replied that he was certainly doing his best in this campaign to give Mr. Lieberman that opportunity.

Both men objected to the existence of racial profiling practices in law enforcement. Both urged acceptance and tolerance regardless of sexual orientation. Mr. Cheney also noted that the Connecticut senator had sounded more conservative on certain social issues before joining Al Gore's ticket. `That conviction isn't quite as strong,' he said, `You're not the crusader that you once were.'

(Credits given)

SIMON: The next presidential debate is Wednesday, Mr. Bush and Mr. Gore in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Wednesday, 9:00 Eastern, 6 Pacific. Good evening from Washington. I'm Scott Simon and this is NPR News.

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