We don't have that challenge now, thank goodness, but we have it on a much smaller scale, where the country is almost divided.

But I've always been an optimist. I think the young people today are just as good or better - in fact much better than [we were]. Better educated, they have better global understanding, they've got all of this high tech information available that we didn't have. Sixty years is a long time.

In my book, I'm writing more or less about me, but it's really about my generation. We were kind of quiet. We didn't go around talking about what happened to us. We were real proud of our country, proud of President Roosevelt, General Eisenhower. Maybe we lack people of that stature now that help rally young people. But I'm still bullish on America and bullish on your generation.

Singer: Getting specifically into your service in Congress and its connection to World War II. A number of your fellow legislators, as I said on both sides of the aisle, served with you - maybe not in your unit - but served along side you in Europe. How do you think that helped with bipartisan relations?

Dole: I think it helped a lot. We had this camaraderie here. Like me and Dan Inouye is a special case where we end up in the same hospital. We didn't know each other before. We were wounded about a week apart, about a hill apart, a couple of miles from each other. I was wounded first, Danny was wounded second. Then we go into a hospital in Battle Creek, Michigan, where there's a guy out there taking care of us who hadn't been injured too badly named Philip Hart, who was one of the great guys that ever served in the Senate. He was running errands for us and everyone else - bedpans and whatever we wanted. He'd bring us in cigarettes, all that stuff. So it was that kind of relationship.

Then you got back into Congress. You knew who the veterans were, not that they were better than anybody else, but you knew if you had a problem - dealing with something maybe not related to defense at all - you had a lot in common with the Democrat or the Republican you wanted to persuade to be with you.

Singer: Now with the situation on the hill seeming to be as bad as it's been in decades - with the ethics struggle in the House, with the "nuclear" or "constitutional" option nearing in the Senate - do you think the two parties can walk away from the precipice and just figure out a way to come back together, or do you see worse in the short term?

Dole: We're not perfect by any means, our form of government. People choose up sides and we vote for President. At least we do it peacefully, and the transition is always very peaceful. Nobody is threatening anybody with conflict.

But I think we go through these little periods where we have this very - I don't say bitter - but very fierce partisanship where people line up 55-45, 51-49. There are always a few middle of the road type people who really have much more influence than their numbers would suggest.

It's pretty hard for me to judge. I haven't been up there for nine years. When I was there, I would sit out there on the floor and try to analyze what are this person's motives, why are they saying what they're saying. I wasn't always right, but after being leader for twelve years I had a pretty good idea what motivated people.

I think we're right in this little two or three year period where it's been a very closely divided Congress, the American people are closely divided. It will straighten out. I'm not really worried about it. There have always been heated debates in the Congress, particularly in the Senate.

I think it will come back to the middle. I consider myself a middle of the road Republican. Maybe when I first started I was more to the right. Again, you learn the same thing. You learn about other people's problems, different problems in different states. Maybe it's immigration, maybe it's something else - homeland security. Maybe I'm just rambling on here, but I think it will work out.

Singer: The man who served between your two stints as Majority Leader, George Mitchell, penned an Op-Ed a couple of days ago for The New York Times saying that at the time he was Senate Majority Leader with a similar majority he could have [invoked the "nuclear" option], but he didn't. Coming from someone who led the Senate as long as you did, what would you be doing today...

Dole: I'd be sitting with whoever it is - Harry Reid, or whoever he designated - and I would... the seat of your pants gets kind of hard, but I would sit there and sit there and look at every possible alternative before you start tinkering with the rules. Senator Byrd has done that, he's tinkered with the rules. Sometimes it was a good idea, sometimes maybe not. But the so-called option, whatever you call it, is a last resort. I think I may be wrong, but I still think there's going to be some kind of a deal struck where both sides can interpret it the way they want.

If I were going to give the Democrats advice, I would say these Appellate judges aren't as important as a Supreme Court Justice. Why not hold your fire until you get a Supreme Court nominee, because if you do it now and lose, you're going to be in a weaker position. And it's hard to get the American people to focus on seven, eight or nine justices around the country, but if you're talking abut a Supreme Court judge, you're going to get a lot of focus, a lot of attention, a lot of media coverage, and that's where the battle ought to be fought in my opinion. Of course my opinion doesn't count.

Singer: One of the last issues you dealt with was the telecommunications reform in 1996, and one of your great concerns was giving away the spectrum for high definition TV, which at the time you said would cost in the tens of billions of dollars.

Dole: I stuck my neck out and almost got it chopped off. It just seemed to me that we had everything, as far as the airwaves were concerned, was free, and people were making big, big profits. And it didn't seem to me, when we had people in need, when we had a deficit, when people didn't have enough to eat, didn't have appropriate healthcare, there was a good place to go - in a very legitimate way - to pick up some revenue.

Singer: You were very prescient about it. In fact the networks have not given back the spectrum that they're supposed to give back - the lower spectrum. Seeing it come up again, what do you envision happening now to retrieve some of that money for the American people?

Dole: I'm just guessing, because I don't have any idea what the legislation might look like, but I think with all of the pressure on the budget, I think the members would be hard pressed not to recoup a substantial amount of that.

Singer: I'll ask one last question because you have to go. You, of course, were in the Senate at the time of the last major overhaul of Social Security in 1983 -

Dole: 1983. People ask me what's the biggest challenge, I tell them education. They ask me what was your biggest achievement, I say working with Senator Pat Moynihan, a Democrat and me a Republican, to rescue Social Security in 1983.

I've always had the view that compromise is a wonderful word if it's used properly, and bipartisanship is necessary. Any good legislation needs support from both parties. I don't care who's the President. It's going to last longer and be more meaningful. It will have more credibility and be accepted by more American people. If it's just a one-party solution, maybe it will work, maybe it's a great thing to do, but the American people like to see Congress working together.

Singer: So should the Republican Party take private accounts off of the table if the Democrats say they won't deal with it?

Dole: I think it's too early. What we have now, we have the President's plan out there - again, unless I'm just totally off base - I think there are going to be some Republicans and Democrats who will come together in the middle with some alternative plans.

The trouble with Social Security is nobody is going to get burned for another, what, how many years? 2018, and then maybe even 2042. You can imagine it's like backing into a buzz saw, to take on Social Security. We did it because we were about to hit that buzz saw, and there was a lot of pressure on us to do something.

What came up with in '83 was raising payroll taxes a little, extending the retirement age to 67, a lot of things that people didn't like. But we were working with - as you know Tip O'Neill was the Speaker, Ronald Reagan was President, Claude Pepper, who was a darling of senior citizens, was on our commission. And so we put it together and had very broad bipartisan support.

Singer: Just one last tag on to that question. With Medicare seeming to be in such larger of a crisis, should Congress start thinking more about Medicare than Social Security?

Dole: I think Congress should think about it and the President should think about it. I'm not sure they can replace it now because they have all of this - I don't know whether it's momentum or not - but all of this discussion about Social Security.

Medicare is in more dire straights than Social Security. But if you can fix Social Security, then I think the Medicare thing will be - I don't want to use George Tenet's word - but a slam dunk.

Singer: Thank you so much for your time.

Dole: Thank you for what you're doing. I really appreciate it.

Singer: It was very educational. Thank you so much

Dole: Good luck, Jonathan. Make all `A's.

Singer: I will.