MR. RUSSERT: Now, Senator McCain's campaign is saying that you take those words totally out of context. Here's how Senator McCain explained what was actually said at the town hall: "It's dishonest because anyone who looks at the entire transcript of the exchange that I had at a town hall meeting with a man who came there, who had a legitimate point of view that he was against the war and asked--we went back and forth about how long, quote, America would be there, and I said, `Well,' he said, `How many years?' I said, `Could be a hundred.' But the case is, it's after we've won the war. And I immediately said it's the same as we have troops in South Korea, we have troops in Japan, we have troops in Germany, depending on the security arrangement that we have.

"No one could have interpreted that exchange as me saying that we're going to be in a war for a hundred years."

DR. DEAN: First of all, we're not arguing that he's going to be at war for a hundred years. We don't think we ought to be in Iraq for a hundred years under any circumstances. Think of the hundreds of billions of dollars that are being spent in Iraq, which we need right here at home right now to preserve American jobs. That's the first thing.

Secondly, if Senator McCain believes that you can occupy a country like Iraq for a hundred years without having a long war and violence and our troops being hurt and, and killed, I think Senator McCain is wrong.

Look, our folks don't want, I--our folks, our country--70 percent of our country does not want to be in Iraq for a hundred years under any circumstances. Senator McCain is wrong. He is out of step with the American people, and he is wrong.

MR. RUSSERT: He is saying it's analogous to Germany or to Japan or to Europe.

DR. DEAN: And South Korea. I have the same quote that you have right here.

MR. RUSSERT: Where you have troops there, but they're not involved in conflict.

DR. DEAN: That is correct. Now, does anyone think, who's watching this show, that if you keep our troops in Iraq for a hundred years, people won't be attacking them and won't be setting off suicide bombs and won't be having militias go after them? I don't think so. And most Americans don't think so. What Senator McCain is saying doesn't make any sense. We cannot be in Iraq for a hundred years. Those dollars belong in America. We're in trouble in this--in, in America. And, frankly, the Bush-McCain economic program has put us in trouble in America. That money needs to be here in America.

MR. RUSSERT: The Republican Party in Virginia has filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission saying that your previous ad and no doubt this one, they will insist, is being coordinated with the Obama and Clinton campaigns, it's all anti-McCain, and that it violates the election rules.

DR. DEAN: Yeah, that is a joke. There's no evidence for that whatsoever, and it's plain untrue. Neither one of the campaigns ever saw this ad or knew anything about it before we put it on. (my emphasis)