captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> ifill: rebel troops clashed with libyan forces, as they took the battle west toward moammar qaddafi's home town of sirte. good evening. i'm gwen ifill. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. on the newshour tonight, we get the latest on the allied air power assisting the opposition and the new momentum of the rebel advance, retaking key towns along the northern coast. >> ifill: and in a speech to the nation tonight, president obama defends u.s. involvement. >> brown: plus, we update the spiraling nuclear crisis in japan, where new radiation levels have been found in the air, seawater, and soil around the fukushima plant. >> ifill: and ray suarez talks

to marcia coyle about today's supreme court free speech arguments involving a campaign finance law in arizona. >> ifill: that's all ahead on tonight's newshour. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: having the security of a strong financial partner certainly lets you breathe easier. for more than 140 years, pacific life has helped millions of americans build a secure financial future. wouldn't it be nice to take a deep breath and relax? your financial professional can tell you about pacific life, the power to help you succeed. >> you can't manufacture pride, but pride builds great cars. and you'll find in the people at toyota, all across america.

chevron. we may have more in common than you think. and by bnsf railway. and by the bill and melinda gates foundation. dedicated to the idea that all people deserve the chance to live a healthy, productive life. and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> ifill: the libyan rebels' drive to oust moammar qaddafi reached the outskirts of his hometown and tribal base today. fighting erupted outside the city of sirte, home to 100,000 people. it's a key stronghold guarding the approaches to tripoli, 225 miles away.

the rebels had already rolled up a series of eastern cities in a lightning advance over the weekend, behind a curtain of coalition air strikes. we have a report from outside sirte from lindsey hilsum of independent television news. >> reporter: they're fighting just east of sirte, colonel qaddafi's birth place. the rebels who swept up the road yesterday found his tanks waiting for them today. rumors have spread that sirte fell in the night but qaddafi's forces are making a stand in what he calls the political capital of africa. we drove past the oil towns. if they hold on to them, the rebels could start exporting crude oil again. they have petrol but no power so the pumps don't work. they call this fishing for gas. it's free. the petrol station's contribution to the revolution. the momentum is with the

rebels, but only because of the allied air strikes. the air is thick with smoke. an electrical cable has been hit. that's what is pumping that black plume into the air. we can hear the occasional thump of the allied air strikes coming in a few kilometers down the road. that's where colonel qaddafi and his armor are. that's where these rebels are heading now. some seem to be taking it easy. but most are keen to move ahead just hoping for more allied air strikes. >> this would be a big help for us. it's very important. otherwise, you know, because the tanks are down there. so if it weren't for the tanks we would keep going. it would be more easier for us. >> reporter: they fan out searching for any of qaddafi's soldiers who might still be lurking, ready to fight. a few yards to the side of the road in the desert, a rebel shows me the identity card of

a qaddafi stoldier he says they captured. as in the midst of this we came across two from manchester trying to get to miss rat a where their family is stranded. >> trying to get in contact with my mom and dad and everybody else. what are you going to do? you have to find out what's going on. i carry no arms. like everybody else. just go with the flow. >> reporter: misrata is still in qaddafi's hands. they've heard nothing from friends or family for more than three weeks. >> i have friends of mine. >> reporter: one family's story among thousands. in a country full of uncertainty where no one can be sure what the next day will bring. >> brown: the rebel gains >> brown: the rebel gains raised

new questions about the extent of the coalition's military mission. russian foreign minister sergey lavrov charged the campaign has gone well beyond protecting civilians, as the u.n. authorized. . >> reports are coming and no one denies them on coalition air force strikes against qaddafi's columns of troops. and reports about the support of the actions of the armed insurgents. there's a clear contradiction here. we believe that interference of the coalition in the internal, as a matter of fact, civil war has not been sanctioned by the u.n. security council resolution. >> ifill: in response, nato's military commander for libya insisted the purpose of the air strikes is unchanged. the alliance agreed on sunday to take control of the libyan operation from the u.s., britain, and france. meanwhile, army general carter ham of the u.s. africa command warned qaddafi's forces could still roll back the rebels, if the air strikes stopped. at a pentagon briefing, vice

admiral bill gortney reinforced that view. >> clearly the opposition is not well organized, and it is not a very robust organization. i mean, that's obvious. so any gain that they make is tenuous based on that. i mean, it's... clearly they're achieving a benefit from the actions that we're taking. we're not coordinating with it. but i think general ham's assessment is pretty good. >> ifill: and in another development, the persian gulf state of qatar formally recognized the rebels as the legitimate representatives of libya. it was the first arab government to take that step. >> brown: still to come on the newshour, new findings of radioactive material around japan's fukushima plant; and supreme court arguments about campaign financing. but first, the other news of the day. here's hari sreenivasan. >> sreenivasan: unrest gripped syria again today, with security forces confronting new protests. the troops used tear gas and

fired into the air to disperse crowds. some 4,000 people demonstrated in daraa, where the protests began more than a week ago. there was also more trouble in the port city of latakia, as armed groups for and against the government faced off. officials said syrian president bashir assad could address the nation as early as tuesday to ease a nearly 50-year state of emergency. in yemen, a powerful explosion at a weapons factory killed at least 78 people. it happened in abyan province in the south. the blast appeared to be accidental, but it came one day after islamic militants took over the factory and the nearby town of jaar. government forces had pulled back, as protests spread. and there were more protests today in the capital city, sanaa. thousands of demonstrators again demanded that president ali abdullah saleh step down. some 250 people have been detained since a crackdown in bahrain this month, and more than 40 are missing. shiite opposition leaders reported those figures today,

and said they've doubled since last week. the kingdom's sunni rulers dismissed appeals for an international human rights investigation. and police insisted their tight control of the streets is essential. >> for the person who does not violate any law or who does not commit any crime, the checkpoints do not concern him. quite the opposite, it reassures their security. it is more safety on the road. as the saying goes, "if you don't steal, you won't fear." as long as you don't commit any crime, you will be passed through the checkpoint with a good heart. >> sreenivasan: bahrain is now under martial law. and roughly 1,000 troops from saudi arabia and other sunni- ruled states are deployed in the country. taliban suicide bombers attacked a construction company in afghanistan today. they shot their way into a compound, blew up a truck loaded with explosives and killed 23 people. nearly 60 others were wounded. and in pakistan, militants killed 11 government soldiers in an ambush near the afghan

border. a saudi arabian man has pleaded not guilty in texas to charges he plotted to blow up targets in texas and new york city. khalid aldawsari was arraigned in federal court in lubbock today. he'd been a college student there when he was arrested in february. agents traced online purchases of explosive chemicals and found a makeshift lab in his apartment. if convicted, aldawsari faces a possible life sentence. the trial is set for may 2. in economic news, consumer spending rose last month, but, the commerce department said much of the gain went to pay sharply higher gasoline prices. and on wall street, stocks began the week on a losing note. the dow jones industrial average lost more than 22 points to close below 12,198. the nasdaq fell 12 points to close at 2730. germany chancellor angela merkel played down a stinging election defeat today tied to the nuclear scare in japan. on sunday, the anti-nuclear greens won power in a state where merkel's christian democrats had governed since 1958. voter fears over what's happened

in japan was the dominant issue. before the election, merkel had ordered a review of nuclear power in germany. she said today the review will go forward. those are some of the day's major stories. now, back to jeff. >> brown: japan's nuclear troubles grew worse still today, even as confirmed deaths from the earthquake and tsunami topped 11,000. officials reported radioactive water has spread beyond a damaged reactor building, and radiation has also gotten into the ground. smoke rising from parts of the fukushima dai-ichi plant was the most visible sign of ongoing trouble, but the real threat lay beyond public view at unit 2 highly radioactive water, first discovered last week, has now escaped the reactor containment building. it was found today in deep utility trenches used for pipes and wiring with an opening just 180 feet from the sea. water has also pooled inside the reactor's basement where radiation levels were measured

at 100,000 times above normal. the japanese government acknowledged its likely the reactor suffered a partial meltdown. in fact, on sunday the radiation level was initially reported to be even worse. >> the water contains 10 million times the usual level of radioactive substances. >> brown: hours later the tokyo electric power company said it had miscalculated and apologized. but the mistake forced employees to flee unit 2 for hours on sunday and interrupted their efforts to jump-start cooling systems. today the government's chief cabinet secretary sharply criticized the utility. >> the measurement of radiation is necessary to secure various aspects of safety at the plant. so these kinds of mistakes cannot be forgiven. >> brown: the problem was not confined to unit 2. workers found reactors 1 and 3 also have radioactive water in their utility trenches. the radiation levels though were significantly lower than

at unit 2. but all tolled, it left crews with an enormous job, trying to remove the hundreds of tons of contaminated water. meanwhile officials announced plutonium has been detected in soil outside the fukushima complex. they insisted the amounts were too small to be a risk to public health. and contamination in sea water was spreading just off shore. japan's nuclear safety agency said there's no immediate health risk because a fishing ban is in effect. amid the rising radiation fears the government urged people not to return to areas near the plant though some have gone back to pick up belongings. we take a closer look now at the situation at the japan reactors and the threats posed by the released radiation. james acton is a physicist who works at the nuclear policy at the carnegie endowment for

international peace. and david brenner, director of the center for radiological research at columbia university. james acton, i'll start with you. what do we know about this new problem of contaminated water outside the reactor and how serious is it? >> it's serious for a couple of reasons. it doesn't actually surprise me that they're finding very large quantities of radioactive water because they've been pumping huge quantities of water into the system. that water has got to go somewhere. the radioactive water there found inside the place is serious because it will complicate the relief effort. the radioactive water they found in the trenches is serious because if they don't pump that quickly into a storage facility there's a chance it will leak out and increase the radiation in the environment. >> brown: just to try to make this complicated equation clear, they now have a process where they have to pump water in to cool off the fuel rods, but they also have to pump out the contaminated water somewhere, to some safe place. >> that's exactly right. i mean, if you think back a couple of weeks to where this crisis started, it started with this race to cool down the fuel rods. they've been doing that by

pumping in a lot of sea water and then more recently fresh water. but that water has to go somewhere. at the moment it's just leaking out into buildings and these trenches. now they have to pump that back in to an area within the plant that they've identified for storage. >> brown: do we know where this contaminated water comes from? you're saying it might come from the water that is is actually being pumped in? >> i think that's where it has to come from. the big question is where is the leak in the system? on friday the japanese authorities reported they were concerned that there was a leak in the reactor pressure. that turns out probably almost certainly not to be wrong. and in this very complicated series of high tech that comes out from the reactor pressure vessels, somewhere in that complicated series of piping there appears to be a leak or leaks. the utility apparently doesn't know where that leak is coming from. >> brown: david brenner in the meantime we have these conflicting very confusing reports on the levels of radiation this weekend.

what do we know right now and where do you see the current danger? >> well, it's distinguished between the radiation levels inside the reactor itself and those of the general population outside are being exposed to. so if we start with the situation outside the reactor, what we've been seeing over the past few days is a steady decrease in radiation exposure levels from a week ago until today. steadily got smaller and smaller which is pleasing and really does reflect the way the wind is blowing as much as anything. the wind is still blowing the radioactivity towards the sea. the situation for the nuclear workers inside the plant, well, that's a different story. it's pretty clear that they are being exposed to high doses of radiation, and we certainly hope not fatal doses. but what they're doing, it would appear, is actually

having more workers now than they did a week ago. so they're trying to spread the radiation dose among more people so that any given person has a lower radiation dose. i'll still very concerned about the long-term issues for the actual radiation workers. i think we could be looking at some serious injuries. >> brown: when... how long is it before you know, before something like that takes effect? >> well, in terms of the worst possible scenario which is mortality, it's typically 30 to 60 days would be the time scale, but i think we would know beforehand whether people were exposed to lethal doses. that's how long it takes for it to happen. >> brown: now, staying with you, and going now outside the reactor to the new reports of radiation in the ground and spreading at sea. now you started to talk a little bit about the impact of that. but fresh that out a little bit for us. how dangerous is it when it

goes into the soil and also into... more into the ocean, spreading in the ocean? >> well, two different situations. it really depends on what something that we don't know quite now is how much radioactivity is being deposited in the sea or in the ground. i think the short-term issues are actually quite small in terms of public health. but we have much more important long-term issues that we're going to face. the dominant radio isotopes will be radioactivity cesium. that has a laugh life of decades so we're really talking about some exposure to the environment for really a generation or more to come. how important that is really depends on how much radioactivity gets into the environment. that we really don't know at this point. but the short-term issues i think are not so important for the general population. the exposures that people are getting short term over the

next days or even weeks, as it stands at the moment, are relatively small. >> brown: james acton, just to help us think about where we're at and what may come about mid or longer term, what does it mean when the authorities tell us that it's likely that there has been a partial meltdown. remind us, what exactly does that mean? >> well, jeff, when you turn off a nuclear reactor, as it were, the fuel rods still generate heat and remain hot. and so you've got to keep those fuel rods cool. if you don't keep them cool then they to melt. that melting lies along a spectrum really. you could have a tiny bit of fuel melting. all the way through to all of the fuel melting. we know that there has been a partial meltdown. that is to say that some of the fuel within the core has melted. but not all of it. part of the difficulty the operators face is you can't just flip the lid on a nuclear reactor and look inside.

we don't actually know how much of the fuel has melted. or indeed many of the other conditions in the core right now. >> brown: david brenner, i want to ask you about the other new report today which is the plutonium found in the ground. what does that tell you? what's the connection here if any? >> well, there are various sources that the plutonium could have come from. i think we're relieved that the levels are actually very low. and actually typical of natural plutonium contamination in this country. so right now we don't have to worry about any biological consequences of that plutonium. there's a very small amount of it. >> brown: so, do we... are we looking-- i'll start with you on this, david brenner. are we looking at days, weeks, months? i mean you were talking about not knowing about the impact for years. but when you think about the new issues that have been raised, particularly the water outside the reactor, what are we looking at here?

>> well, in terms of the workers inside the power plant-- and i must stress again that these are incredibly brave people because they are going into a situation where there is a great deal of potential for harm. this is a short-term issue. they've being exposed to moderate doses or perhaps even high doses of radiation right now. and the issues are short-term. on the point of view of everybody else outside the plant, there are short-term issues to do with the radiation exposure in the next week or two. again as far as we can tell, the extensive measurements that we have would suggest that the risks are not so large. but we are faced with a lower level, much longer-term issue of exposure to the general population over the next few decades. >> brown: let me ask you, james acton, briefly again, the same sort of thing. when you look at the potential

forgetting this under control, are we talking days, weeks, months, longer? what do you look at? >> the longer this crisis goes on for it's become clear the longer it will take for them to get it under control. what they need to do now is clear out all the radioactive from the holds, reconnect the power where it hasn't yet been reconnected, repair the cooling systems where they've been damaged and then get those cooling systems operational. if there's no major setback, i think realistically that process will take at least a few weeks. but if they encounter new setbacks and new problems which unfortunately is a distinct possibility, then it could take significantly longer to get this crisis under control. >> brown: all right. well, i want to thank you both very much for the update. james acton, david brenner, thanks a lot. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> ifill: now, the u.s. supreme court weighs in on public funding for state political campaigns, and to ray suarez. >> suarez: justices waded back in to the hot-button topic of

campaign finance today, for the first time since last year's controversial ruling to allow corporations and unions to spend freely on national campaigns. at issue today is the constitutionality of an arizona law and its formula for providing public financing to political candidates. marcia coyle of the "national law journal" walks us through today's arguments. marcia, it's actually two joined cases. how did arizona free enterprise club versus bennett and... make it to the high court. >> it involves arizona's public financing law. under that law if a candidate qualifies and wants to participate, the candidate receives a lump sum grant at the beginning of the primary or general election. if during the campaign that grant is exceeded by a non-participating opponent's contributions and independent spending by organizations or groups supporting that non-participating opponent, then it triggers matching

funds. the matching funds though are capped by the law. the publicly financed candidate can never receive more than three times the initial grant. a lower court upheld the constitutionality of the law, and it was the arizona freedom pack that brought the challenge as well as several candidates in arizona in the second case that brought the challenge to the supreme court today. >> suarez: is it not public financing per se, as much as the connection between having your money go up, if privately financed candidates raise more money that's attracted all this opposition? >> that's exactly it, ray. the challengers here are not questioning the constitutionality of public financing. they're questioning the matching funds trigger. >> suarez: how did the lawyers arguing against the bill back up their contention that it's unconstitutional? >> william mayer of the institute for justice was representing the challengers. he said that the law

violates... the matching funds trigger violates the first amendment because it kills speech. his clients either refrain from or delay spending money out of fear that they will trigger matching funds for the participating candidate that opposes them. >> suarez: do they have to provide any evidence that it was so, that candidates would raise less money for fear of their opponents getting more public funding? >> he claims in the lower court records there was evidence of some who did refrain or wait until the last minute of a campaign to spend. that was disputed by the opposing lawyer who was defending the law here. that was bradley phillips. he said that this law does not kill speech. in fact, it increases speech. by providing the matching funds... the matching funds ensures that a publicly financed candidate has sufficient money to be competitive. that's more speech not less speech. >> suarez: as the justices quizzed the lawyers, what part of the argument seemed to catch their interest?

>> they really focused on how much of a burden, if there is a burden at all, is the matching funds provision on the non-participating candidate or independent spending groups? justices kagan, society mayor and ginsberg seemed skeptical that there was a burden here and they asked the lawyer challenging the law, what exactly is the burden? is it that you delay spending because you choose to delay? he said no the burden is substantial and the burden is that his clients are coerced into not speaking. on the other side though, chief justice roberts, justices kennedy and alito, they pressed the lawyer defending the law, mr. phillips, on why that isn't a substantial burden. the chief justice said, for example, isn't it just a matter of common sense that if i want to spend $10,000 and i know that that $10,000 is

going to trigger $10,000 for my opponent or maybe 20 or 30,000 dollars depending on how many publicly financed candidates there are in my campaign, then i'm going to think twice before i spend it. mr. phillips said i might think twice but it's not a significant burden. he noted that two-thirds of arizona candidates do participate in the public financing, and he said that at the outset these candidates make a choice as to whether public financing will benefit them. >> suarez: janet napolitano who was governor of arizona once joked that george w. bush raised money for her by holding a very successful republican fund-raiser which in fact enriched her own campaign cofers because she was using the public financing. >> that's true. and the opponents of the law feel that it can be gained in certain ways. but the defenders would say that the benefits far outweigh it. the voters of arizona in 1998

passed a referendum that was in reaction to one of the worst election-related scandals in the state's history. they see this law as essential to preventing corruption in campaigns. >> suarez: so this came out of an arizona corruption case. were the justices put in a position of deciding what's worse: political corruption or free speech in the form of campaign spending. >> i don't think it's a question of what's worse. i think if they ultimately believe-- and some questioned whether this law was designed to prevent corruption or, as the chief justice and justice kennedy indicated is, aren't we really here talking about leveling the playing field? which they have held is an impermissible goal under the first amendment. but i think what they're focused on and what they focus on in all of their campaign finance cases is, is there an i am permissible burden on

speech here? are you discriminating at all on the basis of the identity of the speaker or on the content of the speech? >> suarez: we've got about a minute left. if the justices side with the petitioners here and strike down the arizona law, what effect could that have on campaign finance laws in other states? >> well, it will have an immediate effect in probably... not only in arizona but on about nine other states and more than a dozen cities, municipalities, that have similar funding schemes. what the court says here will be very important as to how local government can continue to experiment with campaign finance systems that are designed to prevent the influence, the corrupting effect of big money in elections. and the court may also say something about public financing of elections in general. we'll just have to wait to see. >> suarez: marshal coyle of the national journal, thanks for talking with us. >> my pleasure, ray.

>> ifill: next tonight, president obama attempts to quiet his critics and make his libya policies clear for the american people. >> ifill: ten days after the u.s. and its allies launched military action in libya, the president will travel to the national defense university at forth mcnair in washington tonight to address several lingering questions. among them, what goals does the u.s. have in mind? president obama, speaking at a town hall meeting at a local public school today, repeated that u.s. involvement will be limited both in time and in scope. >> we were sitting.... >> ifill: but in advance of tonight's speech secretary of state hillary clinton and secretary of defense robert gates made a round of sunday talk show appearances. >> is libya in our vital interest as a country? >> no, i don't think it's vital interest for the united states, but we clearly have interests there.

it's a part of the region which is a vital interest for the united states. >> ifill: clinton said the administration had to intervene to stop libyan leader moammar qaddafi from slaughtering his own people. >> we are choosing among competing imperfect options. i mean, if we were sitting here and benghazi had been taken and tens of thousands of people had been slaughtered and hundreds of thousands had fled, some of them over the border to egypt, destabilizing egypt during its particularly delicate transition, we'd be sitting here and people in the congress and elsewhere would be saying, why didn't we do something? >> ifill: as unrest in the middle east has spread, republicans and democrats have questioned the administration's action in some cases and lack of action in others. >> so now that the objective of establishing a no-fly zone has been reached and our nato allies are ready to assume the command and execution of this mission, it's fair to ask, what is the role of our military and military alliance

in providing support to an opposition that we are only now beginning to understand? >> ifill: much of the public does appear uncertain about the libyan intervention. a new poll taken by the pew research center late last week finds 39% of those surveyed say the u.s. and its allies have a clear goal. 50% say they do not. the president has met with lawmakers about the libyan situation and hearings are expected to focus on the topic this week. the president will also continue making his case tomorrow in a round of interviews with network television anchors. for more on what's at steak for the president tonight we turn to ruth marcus and political columnist roger simon. welcome to you both. why is the president giving this speech tonight? >> because i'm actually surprised that he got to 39% of people who thought there were clear goals. thank you for laughing, roger. the public is confused and

understandably so. about a whole bunch of things. what is the goal? then what? after we achieve the goal, what's libya going to look like? why is this country-- sorry to do this-- different from all other countries in the region or are we going to be going into a bunch of different countries and intervening militarily? and why... first, we weren't going to do it. then we were going to do it. what to make of all of that. there are a lot of different pieces for the president to help unpack tonight. it turns out to be though, i have to say, great timing because things are looking up. >> ifill: actually have good things to.... >> sometimes if you dilly dally, your timing ends up looking great. this one looks good for the president in that sense. >> ifill: of all those questions, roger, which do you think is the most important? >> i think the most important is do we know who the bad guy is? moammar qaddafi. we didn't need much

convincing. but who are the good guys? who are these rebels? in egypt, in cairo, we saw hundreds of thousands of people take to the streets unarmed topple a dictator with no u.s. jets aiding them. now in libya we see pictures of teenagers or young men firing their weapons into the air and shouting slogans. do we know what kind of government is going to be formed by the rebels? is it going to be a democracy? i would certainly like to see one. is it going to be a religious fundamentalist government? is it going to have government that looks kindly upon al qaeda? do we know, firstly, and secondly did we know at the time we sent up our jets and missiles? >> ifill: here's the question. tonight big presidential prime time speech. is the reason he has to give this speech because he hasn't effectively communicated the answers to any of these questions or is it that there are no really good answers to these questions? >> well, there is no answer to

known answer as former defense secretary might say to the fundamental question that roger pointed out. but the reality is the united states and the allies can help shape the answer to the question. i was at the white house today. and a senior official ticked off a whole bunch of different things that we're trying to do to help make the outcomes, to shape the opposition. this is not baclav or the opposition in egypt which had some years to come. this is a much more... it could be shaped. it could turn out well. it could turn out poorly. we could play a role in doing that. we did not... we know... it's a known messy situation but it's an international messy situation. at least. >> what disturbs me about that-- and i agree with you 100%, that's what the goal is.

what disturbs me is we've gone from no fly, which means jets can't fly, enemy jets, libyan jets, to protect the civilians on the ground by blowing up libyan military armored.... >> ifill: no drive essentially. >> no drive. no walk. and now to shaping a government. that's way beyond regime change. we're going to pick the next regime. we're going to shape it. it's not like our intelligence in the mideast is that terrific. >> ifill: not even agreed about regime change, are we? >> that's even jumping the gun. before you stay up at night worrying about whether we're going to be able to help a better group come to power and do it in a way that doesn't backfire on us and make us look like the ugly americans again, qaddafi has to go. here is what people i think are most confused about. the president has said and his people have repeated qaddafi

must go. he no longer has legitimacy. one goal is qaddafi must go, but the goal of this international agreement is not qaddafi must go. >> ifill: it's humanitarian protection. >> yes, and everything else. so we have a mission whose authority is more limited than the goals that we've set out. we're engaged in a bit of finger-crossing here that with a combination of the military action against him and the financial sanctions that have soaked up a bunch of his money, the opposition of his people and a bit of good luck, that he will be so cornered that he will end up leaving, having to leave. >> ifill: roger, put on your big foreign policy cap. 2007 when president obama was candidate obama at his announcement speech he said no american lives can resolve the political disagreement that lies at the heart of somebody else's civil war. are we seeing this president

craft a new doctrine? >> i think we are but i'm not sure the limbs of that doctrine. we haven't used the phrase policeman of the world in quite a while now. but i think we're in danger of sort of ultimate mission creep here. we're setting ourselves up to become the policemen of the mideast. >> ifill: we're not policing bahrain or yemen. >> we intervened in iraq on false information. we intervened in afghanistan for good reason, of course. we were attacked. but ten years later i'm not sure the reason is as clear that we're still there. but having said all that, i expect to see tonight a sort of a mission accomplished speech but without the banner and without the swagger. after all, the president has had some success in libya as ruth has pointed out. no libyan jets are flying. civilians aren't being massacred. >> ifill: no coalition casualties that we know of. >> that we know of.

as we withdraw and even our planes and the tomahawk missiles it seems like no americans will be killed. we have set up a ground work for rebel forces, perhaps to topple qaddafi. >> ifill: why isn't it enough for the president to simply go before the officers tonight at defense national... national defense university and say we set out to do this ten days ago. we have done it. we are now handing it over. what's your problem? >> i actually think that's going to be a pretty good summary of the speech. but then he needs to address the two questions: what happens next in libya? and what about all these other countries? >> ifill: why do he have to address that tonight? >> i think because people are very unsettled about it. people are understandably nervous about it. they want to know if we're going to be the policemen of the world. i think the argument is going to be in the coming days that libya is something of a unique run-off situation.

it's near egypt. it will be destabilizing to egypt if all these people went over the border. it's got a terrible tyrant whom we knew was terrible and who is very unpopular with his people. it is not a haven for al qaeda in the absence of somebody else as yemen would be. it's not an ally like bahrain and so you could make an argument that we are the policemen along with, as part of an international coalition with libya. >> ifill: but only to a point. >> just two quick points. it strikes me now in seeing secretary of state clinton say it on the clip that this destabilization of refugees has become the new domino theory. in the '60s the domino theory was if south vietnam goes communist, then australia will go communist and san francisco will go communist. if it weren't already communist. now we're saying that... i

think she said it a hundred thousand refugees moving into egypt. egypt is a big place. you could set a cup couple of hundred thousand people in cairo and not destabilize everything. i'm not entirely convinced by that argument. the second point i'd like to make is along with all those other things i would love the president to address tonight-- i think he may not-- is how much is this costing us? it's not like we have the wealth we once had. it may be well over a billion dollars. we have already spent on tomahawk missiles alone. there are a lot of things you can buy for a billion dollars these days. >> ifill: we will no what the president has to say later tonight. thank you for your thoughts. >> brown: next, close games, high tension, and major surprises at the men's college basketball tournament.

judy woodruff has our look. >> woodruff: it's why it's called march madness. 11th seed virginia commonwealth university defeated top seed kansas yesterday earning a spot in next weekend's men's final four. only the third number 11 seed ever to make it that far. the coach. >> once again we felt like nobody really thought we could win. going into the game. but these guys believed we could win. they knew we could win. we talked before the game about how nobody else really matters what they think. that's really been our theme throughout the ncaa tournament since we were selected. >> woodruff: they'll face off against 8th seed butler university, last year's runner- up for the national championship. an improbable cinderella versus cinderella match, they

are the two lowest seeds to meet in the semi-finals in tournament history. next weekend's other game is a battle of unlikely goliaths. number 4 kentucky and higher- ranked north carolina takes on number three connecticut. for the first time in tournament history, no number one or number two seed will play in the semi-finals. and only the third college basketball semi-final without a single number one seed. since that ranking system began in 1979. for more now on all this march madness, we're joined by, maggie gray. she is the anchor for videos on sportsillustrated.com. thank you for being with us. so, what adjectives come to mind when you think of next weekend's tournaments? >> it's going to be unprecedented. it's going to be completely unpredictable. we have no idea who is going

to end up in this championship game. as you said it's two cinderellas squaring off on one side of the bracket and two goliaths on the other side. we often ask our self-s in the office, butler made it to the championship game last year, can they be a cinderella again? i don't know. they've proven they deserve to be here. >> woodruff: that was my question. are these cinderellas, butler and bcu, did they get this far because they're that good or was there a fluke involved? >> i think if you look at a first round upset where you have something crazy where a big powerhouse school goes down, that could just be put in a category of just fluke upsets. when you're a virginia commonwealth, if you think about it, they wouldn't be in the tournament if this were last year now that the field is expanded to 68 teams. they had to play to get into the field of 60. they've beaten purdue and georgetown. they beat florida state. and they beat kansas. that's going up against the

biggest college basketball and college power conferences in the country. they have definitely proven this is not a fluke. they deserve to be here. they found the perfect combination at the perfect time. they have a very smart coach. they have a motivated group of upper classmen. that really can be a good recipe for going deep into this tournament. >> woodruff: let's talk about that motivation. we heard the coach say, you know, people... words to the effect people have written us off. what does explain this team which, you know, a lot of analysts said they didn't even belong in the tournament. what explains how they've come so far without people giving them credit for it? >> i think that was the story line especially early on. when the bracket was released on selection sunday, a lot of the pundits went straight to virginia commonwealth and said we do not belong here. i think that the team could use that as motivation but only for so long because after a while when you start beating some pretty big teams like georgetown, like purdue, you're going to start to get a little bit of a big head and maybe the chip starts to come

off your shoulder a little bit. not so with virginia commonwealth. after the... being snubbed or being discredited, if you will, after that has worn off. now they've found that deep-down talent. you have to look at the way they've been winning. they've been leading in a lot of these games especially by double figures against kansas they were up at 14 at half. i mean they are not just winning. they're making a statement with each of these wins. >> woodruff: does it say something about the way this tournament is structured, about the way the seeds are chosen that... two teams like this, that were so far back have now catapulted to the very top? >> well, seeding is almost more dramatic than some of what goes on on the court. if you ask a lot of people, you know, you have a ncaa selection committee. it's ten people. they're usually athletic administrators or conference commissioners and they decide who are the seeds and they use a lot of factors. they use obviously your record with the losses and they also

use your strength of schedule. so when you have mid majors like virginia commonwealth who play in the colonial athletic association they have to look at their body of work. three teams from the colonial athletic association made it into the tournament this year. you have to wonder, they want to make sure that the caliber is actually true to the seed and that every once in a while you get a team that is either overachieving or is just hitting their stride at the right time. that's what virginia commonwealth is doing right now. >> woodruff: not a single number one or number two seed in this final four. >> isn't that great? i mean, i know for people who are fans of those teams i'm sorry to say. that's what makes this tournament fantastic. when you look at the other side with college football and i don't want to start a big war here, but you get number one and number two rank from a computer system. those two teams automatically play for the national championship. this way it's really open. i know obviously you don't

have the physical punishment in a basketball game that you do in a football game. the way it is set up is you give a chance for division 1 college basketball players to try to make a run. i like it when it doesn't go chalk. that's picking all the top seeds to advance out of their games. that makes this tournaments one of the best if not the best post season championship that we have in sports. >> woodruff: quickly, dare i ask for predictions? >> oh, gosh. i mean, i like to say the more you know the worse off you're going to be because it's impossible to predict some of these games. i do like butler, however. they played a national championship game before last year. virginia commonwealth has been a fantastic story. when you look over at the other side of the bracket u-conn with kendall walker has just been absolutely fantastic. they've won nine straight games, started at madison square garden, five in a row and four more in the ncaa tournament. i don't know how you best against them. >> woodruff: there is another

tournament going on. the women's basketball. they are still in the i guess it's called the elite 8. the number one and number two seeds are still in competition. what does it look like there? >> well, yes, you said you have u-conn number one and baylor is number two. it's hard to bet against u-conn. they're back to back reigning ncaa champs. they've only lost one game in two years. that was just a little bit earlier this season. maya moore is their stand-out player. the all-time leading scorer in u-conn history. if they make it to the finals they'll go up against baylor and brit knee grinder. she is 6'8" tall, a shot blocker. she has an outside shot. she's bringing a new gengs to the women's game. people love it that she can throw down dunks in these games. they're going to have a steep hill to climb against u-conn. >> woodruff: maggie gray, "sports illustrated." thank you. >> thank you.

>> ifill: finally tonight, remembering geraldine ferraro. the former democratic vice presidential nominee died saturday after a long struggle with multiple myeloma. she was a congresswoman from new york, when walter mondale tapped her as his running mate in 1984. it made her the first female vice presidential candidate on a major party ticket in u.s. history. in a nationally televised debate in october, 1984, she faced then vice president george h.w. bush. what began as an exchange about foreign policy ended up being about much more. here's a portion of that debate. >> i think i just heard mrs. ferraro say she would do away with all covert action. if so, that has very serious ramifications as the intelligence community knows. this is serious business. and sometimes it's quiet support for a friend so i'll leave that one there. let me help you with the difference, ms. ferraro between iran and the embassy in lebanon. iran, we were hold by a foreign government.

in lebanon, you had a wanton terrorist action where the government opposed it. >> let me just say, first of all, that i almost recent, vice president bush, your patronizing attitude that you have to teach me about foreign policy. i've been a member of congress for six years. i was there when the embassy was held hostage in iran, and i have been there and i have seen what has happened in the past several months, 17 months of your administration. secondly, please don't categorize my answers either. leave the interpretation of my answers to the american people who are watching this debate. >> ifill: jim lehrer asked ferraro about that episode in 1990, during an interview for the pbs series "debating our destiny." here's an excerpt. >> lehrer: did you have a strategy designed to show up george bush in any negative way? >> we had prepared, all right. my staff had prepared for me a whole dossier for george bush,

on his votes, on his record, on what he had done over the last number of years in public service. and actually my goal was not to go at him. his resume is very impressive. it wasn't in any way an attempt to affect or to hurt him in any way. as it was an attempt by me to show the people who i was. i was dealing with it from a much more positive viewpoint. i was distressed when during the course of the debate i had to turn around with that one- liner that you're patronizing me. i didn't want to do that. i didn't want to scold. i didn't want to tell him that he was not dealing with me as an equal. i wanted just to focus on me and i didn't want to give any sort of a negative impression to anybody that was watching. >> lehrer: there was... was that line a rehearsed line?

>> no. i was forced into it. i was forced into it because he wanted to... he was trying to teach me about foreign policy. that was a putdown. i readily admit i was not an expect on foreign policy but i was knowledgeable. i didn't need a man who was vice president of the united states and my opponent turning around and putting me down. >> ifill: that was democratic vice presidential candidate geraldine ferraro speaking to jim lehrer in 1990. ferraro died saturday in boston. she was 75 years old. >> brown: again, the major developments of the day. rebels in libya reached the outskirts of moammar qaddafi's hometown, after a rapid advance over the weekend. president obama planned an evening address to defend the u.s. role in air strikes on libya. and japan's nuclear troubles grew worse still. officials reported radioactive water has spread beyond a damaged reactor building, and plutonium has gotten into the ground. and to hari sreenivasan, for what's on the newshour online. hari? >> sreenivasan: there's more on

the life of geraldine ferraro, including remembrances from gwen and judy on this week's political checklist. on patchwork nation, dante chinni maps access to broadband internet access in different community types across the u.s. and jeffrey kaye blogs about his experience with censorship at an airport newsstand in china. all that and more is on our web site, newshour.pbs.org. gwen? >> ifill: and that's the newshour for tonight. on tuesday, miles o'brien reports from chernobyl, 25 years after the nuclear accident there. i'm gwen ifill. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. we'll see you again soon for the president's address on libya. that's live at 7:30 p.m. eastern, streaming online and on many pbs stations. and of course we'll be back here tomorrow evening. for now, thank you and good night. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by:

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