NBC "Meet the Press" - Transcript

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

MR. GREGORY: We now turn to the author of the new book "Leadership and Crisis," Republican governor of Louisiana , Bobby Jindal . Governor, welcome back to the program. When we talk about politics, you're going to have to answer all the questions.

GOV. BOBBY JINDAL (R-LA): Well...

MR. GREGORY: You can't wiggle out. You can't use the secretary of State argument on. I'm just putting you on notice.

GOV. JINDAL: That's right . That's not my job. Thank you for having me back.

MR. GREGORY: All right.

GOV. JINDAL: It's great to be back.

MR. GREGORY: I, I want to talk, because your book deals a lot with the issue of the role of government . And we'll talk about the gulf oil spill in just a moment. But let me pick up on an area that I asked Secretary Clinton about, the TSA , these airport screeners and some of these searches that are really disturbing people around the country , is this excessive?

GOV. JINDAL: Absolutely. Now, look, let's start off, we cannot be lackadaisical about protecting our country against terrorists , make no mistake about that. But I've got two primary concerns with how they're doing this. First, George Will , Charles Krauthammer , others have made this point...

MR. GREGORY: Conservative columnists.

GOV. JINDAL: Other conservative columnists have made this point; they're not using common sense, they're not using intelligence. Look, there's no reason for them to be doing these body searches of six-year-old, 12-year-old girls traveling from Louisiana to visit their grandparents. We're not talking about profiling , but use the information to actually -- don't let political correctness stop them. Use the information we have to actually apply our defenses to those most likely to cause us harm. But here's the second concern. It feels too much, from this administration , like we're playing a defensive game in the war on terrorism . Yes, we need to harden our infrastructure, but if you have a committed terrorist who's willing to give up their lives, you look at that past pattern. We got lucky with the bomb in Times Square , we got lucky with the cargo packages, we got lucky with the underwear bomber that the devices didn't go off. Luck is not a strategy. We need to be rooting out these networks, we need to be killing these terrorists . I think that the American people are worried when they see an administration worried about reading Miranda rights to the underwear bomber. They worry when they see an administration committed to civilian trials. They wonder, "You're so worried about the rights of the terrorists , what about the rights of the innocent American traveler ?" So, absolutely, I'm concerned that out of political correctness , they're screening people they don't really believe to be dangerous.

MR. GREGORY: So you think profiling is really a better option.

GOV. JINDAL: I don't think it's profiling . I think it's using the information we know. You look at things like, for example, you look at travel patterns, you look at how they purchase their ticket , you look at the information, the intel we've got. We all know -- and again, George Will and others make this point so articulately -- we all know that the grandmother who's being, being body searched doesn't really pose the threat . We know the little girl going to visit her grandmother -- here's the third thing that is also odd. The administration rolled this out right before the busiest travel time of the entire year, never making their case to the American public. If they really believed this was a response to a genuine threat , why didn't they make their case to the American public? The bottom line is, yes, we need to secure our country , but simply playing defense isn't enough.

MR. GREGORY: Well, let me...

GOV. JINDAL: Yes, we need to harden our infrastructure.

MR. GREGORY: Right.

GOV. JINDAL: But I think that it's hard to, to listen to an administration that's reading the Miranda rights, stopping the interrogation of the underwear bomber. And it's so hard to understand , why are they so worried about the terrorist's rights and now our rights?

MR. GREGORY: You know, you, you write about this in your book, and I want to put a portion of it out the way you talk about a therapeutic foreign policy . We'll get that portion of your book and put it on the screen. You write that "Our current therapeutic approach to national security is dangerous. I'm just not interested in empathizing with the 'grievances' of our sworn enemies. Let's figure out where they're vulnerable and destroy them." And hearing what you just said, I think a lot of people would hear that and say, "Is that a serious commentary?" I mean, you keep mentioning the Christmas Day bomber, who actually confessed to what he was doing; and the Miranda rights were not read until later, number one. How could you say that this administration , which has so many areas of continuity and is more robust in targeting terrorists in Pakistan , surging up forces in Afghanistan , a continuity with regard to treatment of, of terror suspects and detainees, how could this be a therapeutic approach to foreign policy and national security ?

GOV. JINDAL: Well, three things. One, I think the Bush administration was also wrong, by the way, the way they treated Richard Reid , the, the shoe bomber . I, I don't just criticize this president, I criticize President Bush .

MR. GREGORY: So you think President Bush just got lucky ?

GOV. JINDAL: No. I...

MR. GREGORY: When there was no strike after -- well, how does Obama just get lucky , but President Bush is better?

GOV. JINDAL: Wait a minute. Let me answer your question. First, I think he was wrong and the administration was wrong in the way they approached that bomber in the same way. I mean, go back to the Miranda rights for the, the underwear bomber. What evidence do they need? He -- I mean, they caught him with the device. What was the purpose? You asked a great question to Secretary Clinton: Why are we doing these civilian trials if they're not going to release them? Why are we compromising sources? But here's the second point. You look at some of President Obama 's writings. You look at how he talks about, "Well, we need to understand the, the disadvantaged backgrounds. This is a matter of social justice and more foreign aid ." Nonsense. The analysts have looked at the terrorists that are coming at us. A -- the disproportionate share are educated, come from privileged backgrounds. The reality is, this isn't about people who don't have enough jobs, who don't have enough social aid. This is about fighting an enemy that hates our way of life . This is a fundamental clash of cultures. And I think that it's important to the war on terrorism that we understand what's at stake. This isn't, "Well, let's go and figure out a way to apologize for America ." This isn't, "Have we offended them because we're supporting Israel ?" I think our foreign policy needs to be based around the understanding this is an enemy that hates our -- and disagrees with our fundamental freedoms.

MR. GREGORY: Let's, let's bring it back home. Let's talk about your book, "Leadership in Crisis ." Here's some video back in May of you having a pretty heated discussion with the president. And we don't have to relitigate the whole issue there. It had to do with expanding food stamp assistance for those affected by the spill. He was concerned about a letter that you had sent out and some of the timing issues, but you make a larger point as a result of that discussion, and, and you write about it in the book. "That encounter with President Obama served as a reminder to me of why Americans are so frustrated with Washington: the feds focus on the wrong things. Political posturing becomes more important than reality. In Washington they live by the motto: 'Perception is reality.' They worry about things they shouldn't and fail to do things that they should focus on. It's called core competence, or lack thereof." Was the administration incompetent in dealing with the gulf oil spill?

GOV. JINDAL: Absolutely. And look, that whole conversation, and even in their response to the book, the administration doesn't get it. They were mad -- he was mad about food stamps . The point was two weeks after the explosion, the, the main issue wasn't food stamps . We were frustrated by the lack of resources , lack of a plan. I write in the book, for example, that there was literally one case, oil coming into Timbalier Bay . There's boom, there, there are resources , there are people, there are boats sitting on the dock in Cocodrie . I take the federal government official in charge of the response to Louisiana by Black Hawk helicopter so he can see the oil, thinking, of course, we'll get a response now. When he sees the oil, he admits there's oil, he admits the resources there. He tells me, because of the bureaucracy, it'll take 24 to 48 hours to move those resources , get them mobilized. That's too late.

A second instance, we have a locally devised solution: vacuum barges to pick up the oil out of the water. The federal government shuts it down for over 24 hours so they can check the valves, so they can count the number of life jackets and fire extinguishers, so they can do routine inspections. After being embarrassed publicly, 24 hours later they admit, "We don't need to do the inspections." But they waste that time in the meantime. Look, the White House comes back in response to the book and says, "Well, we talked to the governor every day." It wasn't access. We had access. We had plenty of access. It was not getting timely action. You and I were talking about the bureaucracy, the red tape . Fake five years ago, in the federal response to Katrina , we saw some of the same impediments again, in response to the oil spill . At one point, we pointed out there was boom, there was materials all over the country sitting in warehouses and facilities. It took too long to relax the regulations to move those resources to the gulf coast . That would be like fighting a war, running out of ammunition on the front lines, having ammunition sitting in the warehouses because that's what the rules say. They didn't cut through the red tape and bureaucracy. They didn't always realize what were the most important things to get done.

MR. GREGORY: The White House has struck back pretty hard at this. You know, one of the things you talk about is being more concerned with the PR strategy, and yet, look at the cover at this book, "Leadership in Crisis ." I mean, you know, you've got a picture of you in, in response to the gulf oil spill. This could be certainly seen as a way to, to shore up your own political standing and use your own PR . And the White House says this, this is a statement they provided to us about some of the substance in the book. I'll put it on the screen. "The governor requested the national guard , we approved and he never put them to work. Governor Jindal pushed for his berms ," those sand berms , we can talk more in just minute, "which everyone has agreed were a mistake. Governor Jindal said that we didn't have a plan for skimmers" and "or boom, when he knows perfectly well that we did, [ National Incident Commander Adm .] Thad Allen described it to him countless times, and Gov. Jindal 's own office approved the plans. He got a daily update on the status of skimmers and boom from the Coast Guard in advance of the daily call." There's nothing, "this is nothing more than trying to sell a book."

GOV. JINDAL: Well, look, the first meeting, he comes on, he tips off the Washington reporter, "Watch this interaction." He tells them, "I'm going to be mad with the governor."

MR. GREGORY: You see -- the president, you're saying.

GOV. JINDAL: The president, the, the White House , I'm not sure he actually called all those reporters up and said, "Watch this." The second time he comes down to Louisiana , at the end of the second meeting -- we have a meeting with parish presidents, other elected officials . The end of the second meeting, he turns to me and Billy Nungesser , parish -- president of Plaquemines Parish , and says, " And I don't want you guys going on TV to criticize me." This is the president of the United States , and he's more worried not about, "Guys, here's the plan. Here's how we're going to fight the oil." Here was the problem, and you look again at the response . Yeah, we talked to him every day, but the, the frustration was actually getting a response , actually getting them to move the assets on the ground. Time and time again , they wouldn't listen to local fishermen. They wouldn't listen to people who lived down there, who know those waters like the back of their hands. From the beginning, they continued to be over reliant on the experts from BP and others. They underestimated the threat . You know, you remember the first several days, there's no...

MR. GREGORY: Right.

GOV. JINDAL: ...oil. Then it's a thousand barrels.

MR. GREGORY: But what about your role, Governor. I mean, your big issue is pushing to build this, this chain of sand berms to get the oil to stop coming ashore. By all accounts, it had a negligible effect, at best.

GOV. JINDAL: Well, that, that's not true, David . We were very pleased. Two things about the sand berms . We've now built over 12 miles, and this is going to be the largest coastal island restoration project in our state 's history, which is something, by the way, that is good for our coast, independent of the oil spill , good to protect us against hurricane surge as well as oil spill . We've collected thousands of pounds of oily debris off these berms . We have been able to stop oil both on the surface and submerged oil. And here's the third thing, if they hadn't slowed us down, they took almost a month to approve the permits. Even after they approved the permits, they wouldn't allow us to dredge the sand from the areas they had already approved. We could have built many more miles. The sand berms were a great success, but here's -- this is another great example. They weren't willing to think outside the box . The federal government themselves approved. The US Corps of Engineers said the positives outweigh the negatives. The -- Admiral Allen and the president both intervened to approve six of those segments. They themselves -- this was a preapproved Coast Guard response to an oil spill , very effective. We are thrilled we did those sand berms .

MR. GREGORY: All right. Well, scientists will disagree with that, but we'll...

GOV. JINDAL: Not every scientist. Now wait a minute, the, the -- it -- let's not say that everybody disagrees. There are scientists that absolutely say this was one of the best things we could do for coast. Now that we've convinced BP not to just make them temporary berms , but to convert them into coastal islands, the, the restoration of what was the original footprint, there are many scientists who have praised this as one of the most significant steps forward.

MR. GREGORY: All right. Let me ask you a bottom line question. Haley Barbour , the governor of Mississippi , somebody who's, who's been a mentor to you, a very important Republican figure, he said on this program back in June, the federal government 's done more right than wrong. What do you know that he doesn't know? What have you seen that he didn't see assessing the situation?

GOV. JINDAL: Well, you go back, you go back to that day. Louisiana at that point had -- it continued to bear the brunt of the oil coming in to our coast, and our frustration was, again, when we wanted resources , they weren't there. When their resources weren't available, we came up with solutions, like jack up barges to make the boom last longer so we could deploy it in real time . It literally -- it took meetings with the president of the United States to cut through the bureaucracy to get that done. And they wasted time in the meantime.

MR. GREGORY: Mm-hmm.

GOV. JINDAL: We wanted solutions like using hard pipe to deflect oil. It took too long for them. What we basically said was, "If you don't have the resources , let us protect our own coast. At least, either lead or get out of the way." And the problem was, either they didn't provide the resources , then when we tried, they interfered with our efforts.

MR. GREGORY: Just a minute left here. Some politics questions here. Do you think the president's a one-term president?

GOV. JINDAL: I think it's up to him. I think the voters said a couple of weeks ago they want to see less deficits, less spending, $14 trillion and counting is too much. The government 24 percent of GDP is too high. They don't want this administration to focus on Obamacare , cap and trade, card check. They want this administration and Congress focused on getting the private sector economy running and growing again.

MR. GREGORY: Mm-hmm.

GOV. JINDAL: If he changes direction, he can certainly make a, a stronger case. But if he stays, if he doubles down on his current path, I think it's going to be very hard to make the case two years from now that he deserves to be re-elected.

MR. GREGORY: You don't want to be president in 2012 ?

GOV. JINDAL: No. You've got the tape from me last time.

MR. GREGORY: I do. You, would you be on a ticket ? Would you be a number two?

GOV. JINDAL: Look, I'm running for re- election in 2011 . I'm running to be the governor of Louisiana . There will be other candidates running for president and vice president.

MR. GREGORY: Would you rule out, rule out being a number two on a ticket ?

GOV. JINDAL: I'm not going to turn down something that's not been offered to me.

MR. GREGORY: OK.

GOV. JINDAL: But I'm not running for vice president. I'm, I'm...

MR. GREGORY: Would you like to be president some day?

GOV. JINDAL: I, look, my only political aspiration is to be re-elected governor for a second term. We've cut spending in Louisiana . Portfolio.com says we've got the second best economic performance in the country . We're not raising taxes .

MR. GREGORY: Yeah.

GOV. JINDAL: I think we can prove a great example in Louisiana of what Washington should be doing instead of borrowing and printing more money.

MR. GREGORY: Sarah Palin gets a great deal of attention as a movement conservative. Can she unite the Republican Party and actually be the nominee?

GOV. JINDAL: I think she can make a compelling case. I think there's several governors, former governors, and others.

MR. GREGORY: Right.

GOV. JINDAL: My bias is, and I've said this before, I like governors because they have to balance their budgets, they have to run their states . They actually have to, to...

MR. GREGORY: Right. Well, she, she was a governor. But the question is, I'm sure she could make a compelling case, but do you think she can unify the party and actually get the nomination, as you survey the landscape?

GOV. JINDAL: I -- look, I'll leave it to the pundits. I'm sure she can. But I'm sure there are a lot of other candidates. I think there's such a focus on the messengers, what's more important is the message. The Republican Party , Karl Rove says we're on probation. He's right. We're on borrowed time . Four years ago we blew it because we defended -- the Republican Party defended earmarks and spending we would never accept. Now the Republicans , I'm glad they've shifted their position on earmarks. They've got to cut nondefense discretionary spending . We've got to show in the next two years we're worthy of being a majority party by cutting spending back to historic norms, cutting taxes , getting the private sector economy growing. Let the pundits figure out who's running in 2012 , who the nominee is going to be, who the RNC chair is going to be. What's more important for us is to show the American people we've learned our lessons, we deserve to be a majority party again.

MR. GREGORY: All right. We'll leave it there. Governor, thank you very much .

GOV. JINDAL: David , thank you for having me.

MR. GREGORY: Up next.

GOV. JINDAL: And buy the book.

Source