The Bush administration says it wants to replace the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein with a secular democracy, but in the power vaccum of post-war Iraq it-s the Shi-ite religious fundamentalist forces that seem to have the political momentum. Donald Rumsfeld says to the idea of a few clerics running Iraq, "That isn-t going to happen." But what if the US sponsors free elections in Iraq and the fundamentalists win? How can the US instill democracy if it vets the possible choices of the Iraqi people? Guest host Marc Cooper explores the political future of post-Saddam Iraq and how to balance the forces of democracy and Islam with Middle East and Islamic specialists from the US and Turkey, the former Middle East correspondent for the New York Times, and a former advisor to then-Turkish Prime Minister Turkit Ozel.
- Making News: New Indictments at Enron
There were more indictments today in still unfolding Enron scandal as former chief financial officer, Andrew Fastow, his wife and several other former executives have been charged with fraud and insider trading. John Emshwiller, who broke the story for the Wall Street Journal, says federal authorities are hoping the broadening base of indictments will lead up the corporate ladder. - Reporter's Notebook: Ivory Coast Tries to Tame Social Chaos
While most of the world focused on Iraq, countries like the Ivory Coast have been decimated by armed conflict. Only when rebels took over an American school there did the country make headlines here. Richard Dowden, director of the Royal African Society, says that savage war has ravaged the former jewel in the crown of French West Africa, but that today-s cease-fire promises hopes of peace.
Guest host MARC COOPER is a veteran Los Angeles reporter and print journalist
Dowden's Times article, "How a model colony slid to the edge of the abyss"