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Just ahead the vice president Dick Cheney and the energy company he once headed are being sued for alleged fraud. Could this be the Republican version that some Democrats say of Whitewater? We'll talk with the head of the organization who filed the lawsuit, Larry Klayman, when LATE EDITION returns.

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BLITZER: Welcome back to LATE EDITION. We're continuing our conversation with Lisa Bloom of Court TV, the criminal defense attorney Roy Black, and joining us here in Washington, Larry Klayman; he's head of Judicial Watch, which is suing Vice President Dick Cheney and the Halliburton Energy Company for alleged fraud while the vice president was the firm's CEO.

Thanks to all of you once again for joining us.

Larry Klayman, go ahead. Quickly make your case against the vice president.

KLAYMAN: Well, Wolf, the president said last Tuesday, "Let the chips fall where they may." He says everybody that's accountable has to be held accountable, and Vice President Cheney's refused to answer questions about his role with Halliburton. In fact, on CNN's "Moneyline" web site, at cnn.com, there was a poll: 95 percent of the American people -- people who read that web site are mostly conservative, mostly white, mostly Wall Streeters -- want him to advance questions. There's something here, Wolf.

BLITZER: But the SEC's investigating. Why do you need to file a separate lawsuit?

KLAYMAN: Well, first of all, government agencies rarely find the high, powerful and mighty guilty of anything. They let them off the hook. We saw Harvey Pitt on another show this morning. He's so grateful for getting a job as SEC commissioner, you can't expect him to look very deeply into that.

But what we're saying is this, is that this company, Halliburton, which in 1995 pled guilty, it pled guilty to doing business with a terrorist state...

BLITZER: That was before Cheney was the CEO.

KLAYMAN: Libya. It's a company that's gotten into trouble before, so it's not inconceivable...

BLITZER: But in '95 Dick Cheney had nothing to do with...

KLAYMAN: He was not, you're correct.

BLITZER: Yes.

KLAYMAN: But it's a company that has had difficulty.

What they did is, they took disputed contracts, cost-plus contracts, before the monies were even known as to whether they'd be profitable or not on those contracts, they booked them as profits. It had the effect of overstating profits, to the investing public, upon which my clients relied, and it wasn't disclosed...

BLITZER: You can't blame Dick Cheney for that, though.

KLAYMAN: Well, I'll tell you why I can. He's CEO. Harry Truman had a sign on his desk...

BLITZER: But he wasn't CEO in '95.

KLAYMAN: He was CEO when the problems occurred with Halliburton, he certainly was.

BLITZER: Subsequent problems, but not that problem.

KLAYMAN: I'm not blaming him for the Libya matter, I'm blaming him for the accounting problem. I'm simply saying, this company is not without fault over the years.

And the fact is, is that there's a videotape -- he did a promotional videotape for the accountants, Arthur Andersen, because he's tried to slough it off on Andersen, and, in that videotape, he says, "I take advice, this is an innovative accounting company, I thank them for their advice."

So he is responsible.

BLITZER: All right. Roy Black, did Larry Klayman convince you?

BLACK: No, I don't think so. There may be some improprieties there, but once again we are now suffering from that misguided opinion of Jones v. Clinton, where the Supreme Court said that a private citizen could sue the president or vice president or government officials while they're still in office. This is a real problem now. Larry is going to tie up the vice president in all kinds of litigation for the next several years, and he's not going to be performing for the American people.

I think that lawsuits like this perhaps could proceed against Halliburton, but I don't think it should proceed against the vice president for the same reasons of the disastrous results that happened after the Supreme Court opinion in Jones v. Clinton about what happened with President Clinton.

BLITZER: The White House says this is a -- I don't know the exact word, but they said basically frivolous, without merit.

Lisa, is this a frivolous lawsuit?

BLOOM: Well, it's hard to tell until the facts come out. But I'll tell you, Wolf, it's a strange day when a nice liberal civil rights lawyer like myself agrees with Judicial Watch, but that strange day has come. I think that it's wonderful that conservatives see that lawsuits can be used as a vehicle by the powerless against the powerful to get disclosure, to get information and discovery, and ultimately to get justice against the big guys, if that's what the evidence warrants.

KLAYMAN: Wolf, and I'm surprised to hear Roy Black say it, because he's a criminal defense lawyer, and he's usually on the side of the little guy, and I admire him for what he's done there down in Miami. I'm from Miami myself.

But what really strikes me as strange is that you're saying someone's above the law, that they're not held accountable. And the fact is that the vice president has to answer questions about Halliburton, just like he has to answer questions about his task force, his energy task force. A judge last Thursday issued an 84-page opinion -- you can see it on our web site at judicialwatch.org -- saying his Justice Department -- the Bush Justice Department lied to the court about separation of powers and about executive power, and that he has to open up his task force to discovery because we need to know what's going on, you can't have secrecy.

BLITZER: Well, Roy, but...

BLACK: But, Larry,...

BLITZER: ... that's an important point that Larry just made. Should the president and the vice president be above the law, immune from these kinds of lawsuits that all of us, other people are, of course, subject to?

BLACK: No, Wolf, they should not. However, they should be during the course of their term in office.

The problem is, look what happened with Clinton. Once we allowed that lawsuit to go forward, who knows how much of his time as president of the United States was spent defending that case? How much time is going to be spent by the vice president...

BLOOM: But, Roy, this is different.

BLACK: ... defending this case?

It should be -- at least as to the vice president, it should be stayed until his term of office is finished. Otherwise, we give people the opportunity, for various partisan reasons, to sue the president and vice president and tie them up in court.

BLITZER: Let's let Lisa -- go ahead, Lisa.

BLOOM: This is different because we're talking about the retirement and the savings of thousands of people. And if misconduct has gone on and people lose their retirement, have it completely wiped out, we need to know now. We don't want to wait four years for people to get justice.

BLACK: Well, there's nobody's retirement account has been effected by Halliburton. I don't know where you come off coming up with that kind of an idea.

BLOOM: Well, we're talking -- we're talking about the misconduct...

BLACK: There is no national emergency over that corporation.

BLOOM: We're talking about the misconduct of corporate CEO that has affected thousands of people and is continuing to affect thousands of people. And I say shine the light, let the accounting practices come to light and let the American people know what's going on at the highest levels of every company, even if Dick Cheney or other high- ranking officials are involved. It's time that we know.

BLACK: And Lisa, Dick Cheney wasn't running Enron or WorldCom. KLAYMAN: Roy, you know, and the only reason, Roy -- Roy, the only reason Mr. Clinton's time is tied up is because he lied about his role with Monica Lewinski. If he had come clean early on, it wouldn't have been tied up, it would have been over quickly. So let...

BLACK: I know, but Larry, we elected him to be president. We didn't elect him to be a defendant in a lawsuit.

KLAYMAN: Well, he can take a deposition for six hours and lay it out and then it's over. Then it's over.

BLITZER: But, Roy Black, the argument that you're making was before that Supreme Court decision, Jones v. Clinton. It's moot right now since the Supreme Court has ruled that individual citizens can sue a sitting president.

BLACK: Well, yes, before the lawsuit, it was that there would be an immunity during the course of their term in office, and that's what the lower courts ruled. The Supreme Court reversed that and said, "No, no, because it's so important and it's not going to take up much of the president's time, it'll be nothing to him, we'll allow this to go ahead."

And of course, now I think if it was represented to them, they'll probably change their minds.

KLAYMAN: I don't think so. You know, there's an irony here, Wolf. The White House comes forward -- on behalf of the president, Ari Fleischer and says, "This is a meritless lawsuit." Historically, president's don't comment on private litigation. The president's now intervening in private litigation. And if, in fact, you shouldn't occupy the time of the office of the president with litigation, why is the president commenting and trying to influence the SEC, his Justice Department and our court with the great weight of the office saying there's nothing there?

BLITZER: Do you want to respond to that? Do you have a response to that, Roy Black?

BLACK: Well, of course, the president is going to make a response because these are politically charged issues. What's happening is that people, probably for good reason, want to show a lot of the statements he made are hypocritical and it's embarrassing. All the things that happened with Harken, which happened with Dick Cheney, certainly these things are embarrassing. And there's a political component to it.

KLAYMAN: Roy, you can hardly say that...

BLOOM: Well, you know, Wolf...

BLITZER: One second. One at a time. Let's let Larry first and then Lisa.

KLAYMAN: I don't think anybody can make that charge with Judicial Watch. We are nonpartisan. We've always been that way. But people have called us conservative. Now, what politically motivated aspect would it have coming from a conservative group? I mean, that's bizarre.

We're here for the law -- for the rule of law. And when someone holds himself up, and the president says, "Dick Cheney's immune from the law," then obviously we're going to take an interest. And we want the full truth to come out to the American people.

BLITZER: Lisa?

BLOOM: And if this lawsuit truly is frivolous, we have ways of getting rid of it very quickly. There'll be a motion to dismiss, within a month the case would be over.

But nobody is above the law in this country. One of the great things about the American system is whether you're a priest, whether you're a police officer, whether you're a CEO, president or vice president, you are answerable under the law. And I think that's an important American value.

BLACK: You know, Lisa, I am shocked that you say a civil lawsuit can be resolved in a month or two with a motion to dismiss. You know that's totally untrue.

BLOOM: If it's frivolous. That is not true. Frivolous lawsuits are dismissed all the time.

BLACK: They take discovery, take depositions. They'll issue subpoenas. Things will go on. Look what happened with Jones v. Clinton. How long did that go on for?

BLOOM: And apparently there was sufficient evidence for that case to go forward.

KLAYMAN: It wasn't frivolous, Roy.

BLOOM: All the way to summary judgment where it was ultimately dismissed on a motion for summary judgment, never went to trial.

BLITZER: All right, we are -- unfortunately, we are all out of time.

A quick question to Larry Klayman before I let you go. You're going after Dick Cheney. I notice you're not going directly after the president of the United States and the problems he may have had with Harken Energy.

KLAYMAN: Well, we're looking into that. We're going to look into it. And if there's something there, we will proceed, because, again, no one is immune from prosecution. But let's see how the facts develop. Let's see if the statute of limitations has run yet. And we'll take a look at it. Government agencies won't do the job, we have to do it, Wolf.

BLITZER: You were a thorn in the side of the Clinton administration. Now you're a thorn in the side of the Bush administration. You're an equal opportunity thorn.

KLAYMAN: Exactly. Maybe I'll change my name.

BLITZER: Larry Klayman, thanks for joining us.

KLAYMAN: Thank you.

BLITZER: Lisa, thank you very much.

BLOOM: Thanks, Wolf.

BLITZER: Roy, pleasure always having you on the program as well.

BLACK: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: Coming up next, the Final Round: Our panel sounds off on the major news of the week. Our Final Round, right after Fredricka Whitfield and a news alert.