E-mail a friendBill Frist
airdate September 4, 2008
A pioneering heart-lung transplant surgeon, Bill Frist was elected to the U.S. Senate from Tennessee in '94 and rose quickly through the ranks to become Majority Leader. Fulfilling his pledge to serve just two terms, he left in '07 and has been mentioned as a possible candidate for governor of Tennessee in 2010. Frist sits on the board of trustees of Save the Children and, each year, performs surgery during medical mission trips to developing countries. He also co-chairs the bi-partisan ONE Vote '08 campaign.
Former Majority Leader discusses his recent African tour and says HIV/AIDS is the biggest public health challenge to the continent. (2:47)
Full interview. (5:44)
Bill Frist
Tavis: Former Senate majority leader Bill Frist also addressed the convention earlier tonight and afterwards I spoke with him about this week and a recent trip he took to Africa with a delegation that included one Cindy McCain.
Senator Frist, nice to see you again, sir.
Bill Frist: Tavis, great to be back.
Tavis: Glad to have you on. Let me start by asking why it was important for you to address the issue around Africa that you addressed at this podium tonight.
Frist: Tavis, as I said tonight, you don't go to war with somebody who has just saved the life of your child, and I think that health diplomacy, public health diplomacy, literally is a currency for peace around the world. As majority leader I saw it in Iraq, I saw it in Afghanistan, I saw it in southern Sudan, and I've seen it at times of the tsunami over in Sri Lanka.
And I just know if we as a nation and our people continue to invest in making the lives of others around the world better, more secure, healthier, more prosperous, that that image of us is better. For moral reasons it's better, but indeed it even makes our world more secure.
Tavis: Whether one likes or loathes or agrees or disagrees with President Bush on a variety of issues, one of the issues that he has gotten some good marks on from time to time, as you know, in part because of your pushing and urging him, he's gotten some decent marks on what he's done or attempted to do for certain parts of the African continent.
What was that about, number one, and number two, what do you expect that John McCain, if elected, can do to improve upon the record even that this last Republican president had?
Frist: The greatest, I think - and I'm a physician, as you know, over 20 years - the greatest moral, humanitarian and public health challenge of the last 100 years is HIV/AIDS. And I, before President Bush came in, I'd been working this hard. I do medical mission trips in Africa every single year and when I started talking to President Bush about it, he said, "Do you mean three million people die every year?"
And I said, "Yes." He said, "You mean societies are being hollowed out? People like you and me, law enforcement, teachers?" "Yes." "You mean there are 10 million orphans out there?" "Yes." He said, "I'm going to do something about it." And he, on the State of the Union message in 2003, said, "I'm going to pledge $15 billion to fight this little virus."
And at the most we were spending about $200 million a year, and he said, "I'm pledging $15 billion." We ended up spending $20 billion and with that - and this is the good news for people, generally - three million people are on lifesaving medicines today in certain countries like Rwanda, I mentioned tonight where I was, we've cut malaria by two-thirds.
Malaria kills - mosquito bite kills children - and other things. There are 20 million more people in school today, all because of this initiative. McCain basically will continue that. He just supported an initiative to in essence double that initial commitment in the United States Senate. And I was with Cindy McCain in Africa; we talked a lot about that. They have pledged to eradicate, totally eradicate, malaria, which kills about a million people a year.
Tavis: Given that you are a physician, as we all know, and given that Governor Palin's youngest child has Down's syndrome, as we all know; given that in her speech the other night she looked at the camera directly and said, "I want to talk to special needs parents," and told them they would have a friend in the White House if they elect the McCain-Palin ticket, and given that because of the Down's syndrome issue, I suspect that this issue of stem cell research is going to come up again. Give me your sense of how all this connects and plays out.
Frist: Yeah, well, it's interesting - and I was chairman of the subcommittee on disability policy for the country, and a lot of people kind of give lip service to it. But we have not yet - and Bob Dole was a little bit the exception - but we have not yet had a leader of the country come forward and say we're not just going to put ramps around and do sidewalks and make elevators easier, which is important.
But we're going to, in essence, guarantee that every child, no matter who they are, no matter what kind of disability they have, will have the opportunity to make the very best of their god-given talents. Now the stem cell issue will be interesting. I sort of separated from President Bush on that. About half the country basically says don't do embryonic stem cell research; the other half says do.
I think there's tremendous science. I think the bottom line, and what's important for people, because we can't really address all the issues now, is that there are ethical, morally ethical - I'm pro-life - pro-life ways to do embryonic stem cell research.
Tavis: Fair enough. So out of this convention now, tell me whether or not - I ask you what I've asked everybody else this week - do you think the party did what it was supposed to do this week, and how do you feel in this eight-week sprint now to November about your party's chances?
Frist: Yeah, it's a horse race. Clearly everybody here is going to say, "We got it, we're moving ahead," but in truth we have 60 days, and part of that's going to be really seeing who this vice presidential nominee who not many people knew of last week, and so there's no way to predict it now. We're just going to let it play out.
Barack Obama's done a great job. Not very much experience, but because of his oratory skills now people feel like they really know him, so that's at the vice presidential level. I think clearly from the Republican side we have a war hero and a commander-in-chief that at the end of the day, if security is the issue, we're going to win for sure.
But now we have somebody who has everybody's best friend. Everybody talks to their wives or their spouses, and that was sort of the common denominator. She understands me, she's like me, she's got problems - she's got family challenges that I have. And yes, great war hero.
Joe Biden, I know him well, as you know - like your professor there. And so that's good and that's strong. Barack Obama, you can't beat him in terms of speaking. That complement of tough on security, the very best, with an understanding of who we are as people, is going to be a tough ticket to beat.
Tavis: I think you're right - it's going to be a horse race.
Frist: Yeah, yeah.
Tavis: And we'll be covering it. I'm always honored to have you no the program.
Frist: Tavis, you're the best. Thanks, man.
Tavis: You are the best. Thanks for coming on.
Frist: Thank you.
Tavis: Former majority leader in the Senate, Bill Frist. And now enjoying life in Tennessee.
Frist: That's right. Thank you, man.
Tavis: Senator Frist, good to see you.
Frist: Good to see you, thank you, Tavis.
Tavis: Thank you.
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