General Clark, this is a wireless question. Would you reinstate the draft? I think they asked this because one of your senior campaign advisers, Congressman Charlie Rangel, says the draft should be reinstated. It's time. Is it?
CLARK: No. I don't think it's time to reinstate the draft. America's armed forces need people who want to be there. And I would not reinstate the draft.
I am worried about the armed forces. And I agree with a lot of things John said. He's exactly right. The armed forces are overextended and particularly with our reservists and our National Guardsmen. We're using them in a way that, frankly, was never intended.
But the answer to this is first to take care of the Reserve, the National Guard, give them the health care they need, give it to them while they're still in their civilian status as Reservists and Guardsmen, and give them the health care they need and their families need when they're deployed and when they return home. And keep them on their full pay and allowances if they're injured in some way and then brought back to the States.
You know, it's a shocking that we found down at Fort Stewart, Georgia. A bunch of guys who fought over in Iraq were left alone in concrete cinderblock buildings. They were reservists and guardsmen. They didn't have enough medics and doctors to keep them there. And they were there for months without getting proper medical care. We should fix it.
But here's the key thing on the draft. We believe that the armed forces are better with a volunteer force. And what this country has to understand is that when it puts a foreign policy in place that the American people don't support, the answer for that is not to reinstitute the draft, but to change the foreign policy, and that's where we're headed with Iraq.
QUESTION: My question is this: Who were you when you were 20 years old? And did you ever think that you would run for president?
COOPER: General Clark?
CLARK: When I was 20 years old, it was the fall of 1965. I was a senior at West Point. Our Army was engaged in Vietnam. The country was still divided, but mostly supportive. I remember going to college campuses, and the organizing was just started.
My classmates and I at West Point were worried. For the first time, we really recognized that when we graduated, we'd be at war. We saw people starting to die. We had about 200,000 troops there.
I realized what it was to serve in the United States Armed Forces. I volunteered for that, because I wanted to protect the country.
CLARK: I stayed with it through Vietnam. And I know today what young people feel, in and out of uniform, when they look at the situation in Iraq.
I went to West Point. I served in the Army because I wanted to protect our country and serve the public. That's why I'm running for president. I never expected to do it.
But I will tell you this. In the fall of '65, I went to Georgetown University for a student conference on the Atlantic Community. I met another young guy from Arkansas. His name was Bill Clinton. And I knew he was going to run for president.
QUESTION: What's your personal comfort level with homosexuals? And do you have any gay friends?
(APPLAUSE)
CLARK: The answer is, I do have gay friends. And there are gays who serve in the United States armed forces, and they do a very good job. But when they are–when they acknowledge who they are and their sexual preference, they leave. So I've got a very good comfort level with it.
CLARK: I think everybody deserves the right to serve. And when I'm president, I'm going to make sure that we treat every man, woman and child in America with dignity and respect. And that includes the opportunities to serve in the United States armed forces.
(APPLAUSE)
COOPER: Let me ask a follow-up then. Did you ever serve with soldiers who knew were gay? And did you ever turn anyone in?
CLARK: Never turned anybody in. But I had people who came to me after they had turned themselves in. And it's a very sad thing because a lot of these people wanted to serve, but they just had a conflict between what they felt on the inside…
COOPER: Are you saying “Don't ask, don't tell” works?
CLARK: I don't think it works everywhere. I've seen it work in some units, but I get a lot of reports where it doesn't work. And I think it depends on the service, it depends on the unit. I think it depends, to some extent, on the commander.
And so, I think the policy, as I've said, the policy needs to be reviewed because there are so many indications that it's not working. I think you start a review with the presumption that it isn't. And let the armed forces leadership go back through it and give us a better policy so that every American who desires to serve can.
QUESTION: My question is for Senator Kerry and for General Clark.
Gays and lesbians have made a tremendous amount of progress in the last 10 years under Clinton and thanks to many of the people on the stage tonight. But what I have a question is, when people want to build a family, they are prevented from doing so. There are adoption barriers. There are problems with permanent partner immigration. And there are also problems with collecting Social Security benefits for deceased partners.
My question is: What can you do to help make sure that every American, including those in the GLBT community, have an opportunity to build and love their families?
COOPER: We want to get you all in. The question was also directed to General Clark, SO very briefly, if you could.
CLARK: Well, I already told you how I feel about gay and lesbian rights and the right to serve.
But let me put it this way to you: My position's gotten pretty well known now and I've spoken out a lot.
CLARK: One of my Army friends came to me. He said, “Sir, I've got a little bit of trouble with your position on gays in the military.” I said, “Well, let me explain it to you this way. If you had a son or daughter who was gay, would you love them? And he said, “Well, yes.” I said, “Would you want them to have the same rights and the same opportunities in life as everybody else?” And he looked at me and he said, “Now I understand why you're saying what you're saying.”
We need to do a lot better job in communicating in this society and crossing barriers and setting aside a lot of old mythologies. And as president of the United States, I'm going to take the lead in doing that.
Thank you.
QUESTION: Good evening. This question is for General Wesley Clark.
As I'm sure you're aware, the Cold War ended over a decade ago. Still the U.S. imposes an ineffective and inhumane embargo against Cuba. If you were elected president, would you change this policy?
(APPLAUSE)
CLARK: The way we won the Cold War was not by isolating Eastern Europe, but by engaging it. We won the Cold War not just because we had great armed forces, but because we had the AFL-CIO, we had Citibank, and we had a Polish pope. And we reached out to Eastern Europe, and we connected with humanity.
CLARK: That's why I'm against embargoes. They don't work.
(APPLAUSE)
When you isolate a country, you strengthen the dictators in it. If you want to change the dictators, you've got to open it up so ordinary people in those countries can see what they're missing in the rest of the world, and gain strength and ideas from everybody else. And they'll take control of their future.
We're not going to reward Fidel Castro, but we are going to make sure that Cubans have a democracy and they have the same rights as everybody else on this planet.
COOPER: All right, we are getting a lot of e-mail pouring in. Probably a predictable question just got asked. It is an e-mail from a viewer: “Which of you are ready to admit to having used marijuana in the past?”
And they want us to go around and ask each of you.
COOPER: General Clark?
CLARK: Never used it.