White House Press Briefing with Ari Fleischer February 25, 2002

Ari & I

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Published on Monday, February 25, 2002

	7/14/03: Ari, in the 2002 election campaign, the Republican Party took in $7.2 million from convicted criminals. Is the President okay with his party taking millions of dollars from convicted criminals?...
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	5/14/03: Ari, you said on April 10th, about weapons of mass destruction, "That is what this war was about." On Sunday, The Washington Post reported that the group directing U.S. search efforts for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq is winding down operations without finding proof...
	5/8/03: Ari, the President was in Santa Clara, California last week. And he appeared at United Defense, a major defense contractor controlled by the Carlyle Group. The President's father is a paid advisor to the Carlyle Group...
	4/22/03: Ari, MSNBC reported this week that Israel's nuclear weapons arsenal rivals that of France and Britain. Given that arsenal, does the President support Syria's call to make the Middle East a region free of weapons of mass destruction?...
	4/15/03: Ari, a 21-year-old British peace activist, Thomas Hurndall, was shot by an Israeli sharp shooter and killed on Friday. That brings to four the foreign peace makers who -- peace activists who have been shot or killed or wounded in the last couple weeks. I'm wondering if the President is concerned that the Israelis are targeting peace activists?...
	4/14/03: Ari, Lawrence Eagleburger, the Secretary of State under George Bush Sr, told the BBC yesterday: "If George Bush Jr. decided he was going to turn the troops loose on Syria and Iran - after that he would last in office for about 15 minutes"...
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Ari & I
White House Press Briefing with Ari Fleischer

Monday, February 25, 2002

by Russell Mokhiber

Mokhiber: The Wall Street Journal reports this morning that Secretary O'Neill is heading a task force on corporate reform, and that they are exploring ways to make it easier for the government to punish corporate officers and directors accused of misleading shareholders. Question -- is the President going to take a position on corporate reform?

Ari Fleischer: The President created that task force. The answer is yes.

Mokhiber: When will that be?

Fleischer: They are working right now on what to do on a range of options on what to do on the corporate governance side. As you know, the collapse of Enron created a series of issues about how to protect people's pensions, what pension reforms should be required, as well as what areas of corporate governance, particularly involving accounting, honesty in statements, transparency, any kind of wrongdoing -- it all needs to be explored. The pension side came to a conclusion, and the President submitted a proposal to the Congress and he continues to urge the Congress to pass [it] to take care and protect people's pensions. On the corporate governance side, the task force is still meeting. I cannot give you a specific date on when they will have the recommendations. The President is looking forward to receiving them. He thinks that is something that can and should be done by the Congress this year.

Mokhiber: If I could follow-up -- (Ari moves on).

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-Thanks to Russell Mokhiber

White House reporter Russell Mokhiber is the editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime Reporter - www.corporatecrimereporter.com. He co-authors the weekly Focus on the Corporation column with Robert Weissman which Common Dreams publishes. He can be reached at: russell@nationalpress.com