DEAN: ...  You know, she's [Harriet Miers] a person who's very much below the radar screen as the president's legal counsel.  But there's a lot of questions.  I do think the president should make sure the Senate knows about her positions that she took while she was the president's legal counsel because it's the only documentation that we're going to have about what she believes.

MATTHEWS: Do you believe that the president can claim executive privilege?

DEAN: Well, certainly the president can claim executive privilege.  But in the this case, I think with a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court, you can't play, you know, hide the salami, or whatever it's called.

MATTHEWS: Are you being consistent?  During the campaign, there was an issue of you releasing records from Montpelier.  And you were fighting that case, you were saying, "I don't want to release these records.  They divulge a lot of personal matters.  I'm not going to do it."  Now you're saying the president should release these papers.

DEAN: Well, actually, I did release about 2/3 of our records.  The stuff that I didn't release was stuff — was not about people who were up for appointment to the United States Supreme Court, I can assure you of that.

MATTHEWS: (here comes the journalist follow up part ..)     .........  Hello?  Chris, are you there?