Go back where he came from because of how damaging he was to the republican brand. And you heard some of this from the white house even over the last few weeks with the president reminding people that he had supported Luther Strange at first and casting his support for roy moore and purely in the terms of trying to keep a republican in this seat. But i dont think the white house or any other National Republican will be sorry to see this challenge defeated and hopefully for their sake, roy moore to go away finally. But, garrett, lets talk about how roy moore is trying to contest this. Hes trying to say that there was voter fraud. Hes trying to say that there was election tampering essentially. That votes were counted that should not have been counted. This is a playbook that was laid out by the president himself during not only the 2016 election when he thought he was going to lose but also afterwards when hes talking about trying to make up for the fact that he did not win the popular vote. Hes got this commission thats supposed to be investigating voter fraud. So we are seeing this refusal by republican candidates who lose taking a page out of the president s playbook that has convinced some voters that if a republican doesnt win, its an unfair election. Well, katy, a few days left in 2017 but maybe we could hit peak irony and have the Voter Integrity Commission take a look at this race for roy moore and go back and count the votes. The moore effort to reopen this race is a potpourri of weirdness. Not only does he accuse there of being instances of voter fraud, enough to swing the 20,000plus votes that separated the two. The complaint by the Moore Campaign also says he went back and did a Lie Detector Test administered by someone presumably that he paid for, which would clear him somehow of all the wrongdoings with which he was accuse during the campaign. There is no credibility to this claim by moore. And mainstream republicans, i cant think of any republican saying roy moore should continue to fight this out. Mainstream republicans, including the president , have said its time to admit defeat here and for roy moore to go away. Doug jones will be in the senate in january. Thats an insurmountable fact at this point. Were waiting on the Alabama State canvassing board to certify doug jones victory. Thats what youre looking at there in the on the righthand lefthand side your screen. Garrett haake with me in palm beach. Carrie sheffield is the founder of bold media and a conservative commentator. A potpourri of weirdness. We heard garrett say that. But roy moore is, regardless, trying to say this election wasnt fair. He is trying to say there was voter fraud. Looking at Jefferson County in particularly. Jefferson county where a number of africanamericans turned out to vote. Why wouldnt you extend the racism he contribuexhibited in campaign to this claim. That horse he rode in has been named boarish, ungracious and, worst of all, disdain for democracy. This is not just a futile attempt. It is a repulsive attempt to try to claim that somehow he was disadvantaged when the only disadvantage he had was given his career, which had demonstrated clearly that he was not fit for office. Does this affect the Republican Party at all, carrie . You have this candidate who is refusing to concede. Takinge ining page out of the president s playbook. What does this do to republicans and their message in general . Well, voter fraud should be looked at. It is a problem, but i think the fact when you say voter fraud is a problem. What evidence are you using. Sure, im just saying in general, we need to maintain the integrity of the ballot box. But it was a 20,000 gap in terms of electoral loss on the part of roy moore versus the secretary of state who himself voted for roy moore, he said. Hes only received about 100 complaints and theyve investigated 60 of those complaints. I agree the gap is insurmountable. I would say, though, you mentioned the president questioning in his commission, the d. C. Circuit court of appeals which is a feeder court often to the Supreme Court ruled this week in favor of the president s electoral commission. Its not the end of that, and i do agree that whoever is bringing the claim needs to have their claim heard. Just to go off topic here for a second. The head of Donald TrumpsVoter Fraud Commission says he cant say that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote. Hes also said to me on this show that he cant even say that donald trump won. So lets just remind everyone about that. But lets i want to play just because were talking about voter fraud. Were seeing this right out of Donald Trumps playbook. Lets go back and take a look at all the times donald trump said the system is rigged. Take a listen. You wont vote 15 times, but people will. Theyll vote many times. And how that could have happened is unbelievable. Go down to certain areas and watch and study and make sure other people dont come in and vote five times. If you do that, were not going to lose. The only way we can lose in my opinion, i really mean this, pennsylvania, is if cheating goes on. Remember, were competing in a rigged election. This is a rigged election. They even want to try to rig the election at the polling booths. People that have died ten years ago are still voting. Illegal immigrants are voting. That is just a small portion of the times that donald trump says that on the campaign trail. Remember this is the end of the campaign when he thought he was going to lose. He was saying it in pennsylvania. Saying it in rural pennsylvania. On the outskirts saying you have to watch places like philadelphia. Why would you watch places like philadelphia . Thats where the minority vote was. A lot of questions. Why is he bringing this up . Whats he trying to do . How is he going to affect our elections Going Forward. What can voters do . Can you trust our political system . Can you trust a vote you cast is going to count . And now we see roy moore doing this. And i know this is just a small version of this. Doug jones is going to get certified, but what is that doing to the foundations of our democracy. What message is that sending voters . Its dissembling it. Its the greatest and worst aspect of the trump campaign. Were looking at trust in the congress slightly above one digit. And thats across the board of all democratic institutions. And religious institutions as well. Were in a period of time, as you so accurately report, that we dont know what the truth is. We dont know what facts are. Everything has been so muddied and dissembled. The only thing from that comment the president now president made during the campaign suggests that they, the pronoun they, was the russians. That appears to be the real thing. The only two truths ive heard in 2017 are when the president was quoted himself on access hollywood and second when he told a group of very wealthy people in new york city, at a very fancy restaurant, ill cut your taxes. Those are the only two facts i carry into 2018. Are you worried about this undermining of our systems . If we keep screaming voter fraud when theres no real evidence of voter fraud that voters are not going to trust anything Going Forward . Well, you know, and i agree no matter where the concerns are coming from, whether its concerns about russian meddling or voter i. D. Laws, jason riley from the wall street journal, an africanamerican conservative had a great column talking about how if doug jones had lost, then there would be trying about voter i. D. Laws in alabama. So this certainly, the integrity of the ballot box has been something that on the left and the rirkght, people have been raising flags voter i. D. Laws are different than voter fraud. There are studies done about voter fraud and it hasnt been credibly proven to change the results of any election. Voter i. D. Laws have been shown to really affect whether or not minorities vote or poor people vote. Whether they have access to the i. D. S, the money to get those i. D. S and access to the offices to get those i. D. S. Theres a big problem in alabama about access to drivers license offices. They closed a number of them in areas where the minority vote was higher than or could have been potentially higher than the caucasian vote. I want to dip in really quickly to i think the voter i. D. Laws are very well come back to you. Montgomery, alabama. Lets dip in and watch as doug jones gets certified. Just for a moment. When all signatures are completed if youll return the certificate to the proper stack. One set of the results will go with you, governor ivey, for your staff. Regarding proclaiming the election results. General marshall, a copy for you if you want to take it as well, and then we have a copy for our office. Thats why theres three copies. The certification was completed at 1 10 p. M. This afternoon. We would now like to open the floor for any other business, if theres anything that the board feels like it would like to speak to. Doug jones as the senator from alabama. You just heard it right there. The certification of doug jones as the senator for alabama happened at 1 10. Thats 1 10 in montgomery, alabama. 2 10 here on the east coast. We dont normally watch these sorts of things. Lets give you an update. The governor kay ivey, also Steve Marshall who i believe is the i just lost his drop that banner we can say hes the attorney general of alabama. And they were again, saying to the people of alabama, and to roy moore, that he is not a senator and that doug jones is. Doug jones won that election. Hell be serving the state of alabama in congress. We were talking about voter fraud versus voter i. D. , and you wanted to make a point. Go ahead. Sure. In terms of voter i. D. , i would push back, especially in talking to a number of africanamerican conservative friends to say its patronizing to say that africanamericans are unable to get a drivers license. Not to mention a drivers license is very important to do a number of functions in society. So i would i didnt just say africanamericans. I said minorities and folks who dont have the means and some poor people who dont have the means to easily get to those offices. And its been shown by various and multiple studies that the majority of people who affected by voter i. D. Laws are minorities and people of lesser means. Thats just the facts. Again, its important to not underestimate the power of im not painting a broad brush. Im saying no africanamericans can get a drivers license. Sure. And i think that all of us here want to preserve the integrity of the voter process. And we can respectfully disagree on the question of voter i. D. Laws. But to the broader question in terms of voter integrity and preserving the ballot box, it is a sa a sacred thing we need to preserve. One thing raised in terms of the, leks. More than 7 Million People are double registered. Its a very common thing theres a lot of people who are double registered but it hasnt been proven they vote in a lot of places. I believe steve bannon was double registered. But it happens a lot when people move to another state but it hasnt been proven they vote twice in two different states. I want to get von hilliard on the phone. He spent quite a bit of time in alabama covering the roy moore race, watching the ups and downs of it and getting a lot of reaction from the only from voters but trying to get reaction from the campaign itself on the allegations and the roller coaster ride that we saw down there. What are you hearing . Im in touch with now katy with someone at the Moore Campaign. Theyre in a frazzle knowing that the certification process would be going on here today. Of course, there was sort of 11th hour, right, the election was now more than two weeks ago when they actually submitted this restraining order last night. So they left themselves with essentially no time at this point. And as weve seen now, the judge denied that restraining order, and the alabama secretary of state has certified the election results. I should note, though, that this individual within the campaign right now tells me that they are still discussing inside of the campaign exactly what their next step is and that theyll let me know of a decision here soon. But specifically, should note they says just because they certified the election does not mean that we cannot contest this. And i should note, katy, that, you know, i have attempted to do a story, right, sort of the postmortem story on what happened with the roy Moore Campaign, where does this go from here . But within this apparatus, it became very apparent within that first week that this was not a campaign that had any intention of letting this go. Its been alluded to me to wait to see what happens. That this is not the last youre going to be hearing of the moore family. This is a man who was willing to propagate the idea of a conspiracy during the campaign. We heard it from more than a month. Calling the washington establishment liberals. Essentially setting it up that everyone who was working against him in the campaign and at this point, i should know its not all that unsurprising. If you saw the letter that the campaign put out there last night, suggesting that there were voting irregularities in different precincts. We were at one of those precincts. And im not im no election expert, but across the board, we were hearing from the campaign that day that not only high voter turn dlout which the results drew in from montgomery and also in Rural Communities where roy Moore Campaign turned out voters in those areas. Such a high number of crossover republican voters, as well as democratic turnout. Again, no election expert here. This is something we watched unfold a year ago, but the question is, what exactly does the Moore Campaign plan on doing from this point on because a week from now the jones campaign, or i should say senator joneselect is already staffing up. They are preparing to go to washington, d. C. This is going to be your next u. S. Senator unless roy moore figures out something to do in terms of contesting this beyond that. Katy . Weve got a statement just now from doug jones, the sern e senatorelect. Im looking forward to going to work for the people of alabama. It marks a new chapter for our state and nation. Ill be an independent voice and work to find Common Ground with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to get washington back on track and fight to make our country a better place for all. Final thought to carrie. Do you think coming up in 2018 that its a good idea to run toward President Trump or run away from him if you are a republican running . Well, i think it really depends on your state. It depends on whats happening in your state, and thats the beauty of a federalist system that we have state and federal candidates but in terms of trumps policies, whats happened as it relates to net neutrality, the tax plan, jerusalem, over and over, these are policies that i agree with as a conservative and i think that a lot of conservatives are going to be mobilized in 2018. Absolutely, in a Midterm Election when you have a party thats a majority in the white house, the map tends to lean against them. Certainly there will be some headwinds. The lessons of roy moore should be a warning call and a wakeup call for the Republican Party to vet your candidates better. Make sure that your candidate has a track record of standing for conservative principle and not, you know, veering off into these really offensive statements. So thats my hope for 2018. Kerry and peter, thank you guys for joining us. Happy new year. Still ahead it wasnt that long ago that President Trump called Michael Flynn a, quote, wonderful guy. Now a new report reveals his attorneys are preparing an attack on the general, and they could call him a liar. R. A wor like, a dagger . A tiny sword . Bread. Breadstick . A matchstick a lamppost coin slot no . Uhhh. 10 seconds. A stick a Walking Stick eiffel tower, Mount Kilimanjaro ding time sorry, its a tandem bicycle. What . What . as long as sloths are slow, you can count on geico saving folks money. Fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. Going somewhere . Whoooo. Heres some advice. Tripadvisor now searches more. Than 200 booking sites to find the hotel you want and save you up to 30 . Trust this birds words. Tripadvisor. Could the new year bring a new line of attacks from the president s legal team. Theyre wanting to paint flynn as a liar. A reminder, the president refused to criticize his former National Security adviser even after he fired him for lying to Vice President pence. Even after Robert Mueller cut a deal with him for lying to the fbi. Another reminder, the president has called flynn a wonderful man and a very good person who is being treated very, very unfairly by the media. What changed with the president s legal team . Are they on the same page as the president . And what could flynn, who was one of trumps closest and most Loyal Campaign aides tell Robert Mueller. Flynn isnt the only focus for the special counsel. A new report shows mueller is ig the rnc and its digital operation during the election. A line of investigation that could could prove problematic for jared kushner. Lets go now to natasha bertrand, political koernts for business insider. Also elizabeth holtzsman and a former u. S. Congresswoman who voted to impeach president nixon. And msnbc legal analyst danny savalos. Thanks for being here. I think we should remind our viewers of all the ways donald trump has praised Michael Flynn. Lets watch. Michael flynn, general flynn, is a wonderful man. I think hes been treated very, very unfairly by the media. I think its very, very unfair whats happened to general flynn, the way he was treated. I do feel badly for him. I think he served the country. He was a general. This man has served for many years. Hes a general. Hes a in my opinion, a very good person. Well, i feel badly for general flynn. I feel very badly. Hes led a very strong life. So john dowd, the president s lawyer called this fake news. This is a Washington Post report that says that theyre readying to call mike flynn a liar if they need to, if he says things that will not help the president , to Robert Mueller. How do they do that . How do they do that credibly, and can they, when we have all of that tape of the president calling flynn such a great guy . Im not sure why theyd call it, the Washington Post article, fake news. This is a Standard Defense strategy to cast him as a liar, to undermine his credibility. But, yeah, its going to be really, really difficult for them to say, look, the person we hired as National Security adviser is a liar. The person that trump has been praising for the last six to eight months nonstop saying that hes been treated unfairly in comparison to the way Hillary Clinton was treated, its going to be very, very difficult. And there were reports that emerged that trump continued to speak to Michael Flynn even after he left the white house saying that he really wished that Michael Flynn was still there. That he regretted the fact he had to be outed and we saw that tweet he sent a couple weeks ago about how he had to fire Michael Flynn because he lied to mike pence and the fbi. Its really unfortunate, unfair because Hillary Clinton has not received the same kind of treatment. So its really going to be difficult for the prosecutors and the defense to the prosecutors to, you know, its going to be difficult for the defense to say that he is now doing this 180 in terms of his legal strategy. Why now, though . Weve known that flynn cut a deal with mueller for a little bit of time. At least a few weeks. Why have they decided to if this is true, this leak this story now. They are clearly getting very worried. Flynn has been cooperate with mueller now for the better part of a month. He has communicated he has many communications with the Transition Team that have now been turned over to mueller without the Transition Teams knowledge. Those are being contested but its very unlikely Robert Mueller will have to turn them back over to the Transition Team. Documents are really going to be the key to proving all of this. Whether they cast flynn as a liar, if they have hard proof, emails, things that showed that donald trump and others knew what Michael Flynn was doing and why he lied to the fbi, then its going to be really difficult for the defense team to let this stand. If youre flynns defense team, how do you react to this . You do what every defense team has done since time in memorial. You point at the cooperating witness, like flynn, and you call him a liar, liar. You tell the jury this mans pants are on fire. You background him and in cases where a witness as provided false statements like this one, you have two avenues. Number one, is that he is singing for his supper. He would do anything to protect himself, keep himself out of jail and more than that, if they have threatened his son with prosecution. You do anything for your son, wouldnt you . Yes, i would. Would you die for him . Yes, i would. Would you lie for him and they never have an answer for that one. So the other thing is this is false statements. Hes already convicted of one crime. And that crime is lying to the very government who is now here telling you to believe him. But if youre flynns team, that makes total sense. And it seems like an easy argument for the trump team to make. But if youre flynns team and you see this, this is a team that maybe you thought at one point might give you a pardon. Your brother is advocating for the president to give you a pardon, what does flynns legal team do with this . It makes no difference. You remain silent. By now hes already entered into an agreement with u. S. Attorneys to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth, and, as they debriefed him, if he does not testify consistently with what hes already told them, he will pay for it at sentencing. So the move for the flynn team remain silent, dont go public. Follow your agreement with the u. S. Attorney so they dont consider you in breach, and then hammer you at sentencing. Who has the upper hand . Is it flynn and Robert Mueller, or is it the president s legal team . Robert mueller here has the upper hand. We are not sure yet what hes going to find out. But i dont believe he would have made a deal of this kind with flynn. Knowing just what was said here before that he can be attacked, pummeled, punched for having gave statements to the fbi. Mueller is not giving him a pass without being sure that, one, flynn is credible in terms of what hes saying about higher ups and, two, that there is some corroboration for what hes saying. So my view is that this shows a little bit of panic, maybe a lot of panic, but its not unexpected. The question is, what does mueller have still up his sleeve . We know hes not finished with the investigation. No. The president s legal team wants to say that they are about to wrap up this investigation and theyre going to exonerate the president. Well see if that happens. If initially they said thanksgiving and then christmas, now the new year which means we might get an announcement in the next two days, who knows. But when you think about flynn, you guys watch the campaign. You were there. You saw how Michael Flynn was introducing donald trump at campaign rallies. He was leading chants of lock her up at the rnc. He was on the plane with donald trump more so if not just as much as the other campaign aides. He was very trusted. And hes a guy the president has refused to criticize. Yes. And on top of that, we know that the president may have committed a crime by calling the head of the fbi the head of National Intelligence and the head of the cia saying wont you tell comey to lay off his investigation of flynn. So theres a lot here in terms of incriminating donald trump. Thats for sure. There is a lot to be discovered, lets say that. Were going to wait and see what exactly Robert Mueller comes back with whenever that may be. No clue as of now. Natasha bertrand, elizabeth holtsman and thank you and happy new year. Theres been a mad dash by homeowners, many of you out there to pay the property taxes before the new tax law takes effect. But will their scramble make a difference, or will it be in vain . New york governor andrew cuomo, who signed an emergency order to help or try to help at least, joins me next. I am totally blind. And non24 can throw my days and nights out of sync, keeping me from the things i love to do. Talk to your doctor, and call 8442142424. The market. Redict but through good times and bad. At t. Rowe price. Weve helped our investors stay confident for over 75 years. Call us or your advisor. T. Rowe price. Invest with confidence. We certainly dont understand but our accountant told us you should do this if you can do it and before the end of the year. Our taxes are way above 10,000 if thats really the cap, then well lose that entire deduction. If we dont do it. So were paying it this year. As the old saying goes, nothing is certain but death and taxes. And now you can add confusion as people scramble to understand what the new changes to the tax codes mean for them. A major change involves the state and local Tax Deduction often used by people in high tax states such as new york, new jersey and california. This year, you can deduct all state and local Property Income and sales taxes on your federal return. But starting next year, that deduction will be capped at 10,000. People who live in high state areas have rushed to local tax offices to prepay next years property taxes so they can take advantage of the full deduction for at least one more year. For many it may be in vain. Homeowners can only deduct prepaid property taxes if those taxes were assessed this year. Well talk to andrew cuomo who joins me live to explain why hes issued an emergency executive order for homeowners in his state. First eric is in greenberg, new york, about 25 miles north of new york city. Eric, im confused. Im sure people out there are confused. Whats happening . So you can see behind me these lines have been hundreds of people here all day. Greenburgh is in West Chester County. One of the highest property tax counties in the country. And people have been showing up since yesterday. A lot of people have questions. I didnt talk to my tax planner. I just showed up here. Went to the town Tax Collectors Office and said how much do i owe . This is to figure out what your bill is. The other line is to go pay that bill. People have blank checkbooks ready to write them out. The town supervisor has been here bombarded by questions. Its confusion because the town says you can pay your town taxes but a West Chester County executive says well not give you a bill for next year and the governor, governor cuomo, a democrat, said we want those towns to accept these payments. Its a mix between your town, county, state. They all have different rules. Trying to get them to all come together is confusing people. People walking in here with crutches and canes, they can barely get in the door but want to beat the yearend deadline to figure out what can i pay now and what will you accept . Merry christmas. Weve given you a trip to your local municipality to figure out your taxes. That sounds like a great present. Cnbcs eric chemmy, thanks very much. Joining us to make sense of whats going on, new york governor andrew cuomo. He signed an executive order allowing new yorkers to prepay their 2018 school and property taxes to deduct them on their 2017 return. When you governor, thanks for joining us. When you saw the tax bill pass and the confusion that its elicited among people in your state, how does that executive order help them in the wake of this irs news that property tax prepayments are going to be capped . Yeah, its not that confusing. Its a scramble. This is what happens when washington passes a bill in the dead of night and doesnt vet it with the public. They called it a tax cut. Its not a tax cut for new yo yorkers, californians, people who live in plu stablue states, democratic states. Its a tax increase. What they did was they financed a tax cut for the rich and the corporations at the expense of the blue states. One of the ways they did that was by eliminating the deductability of state and local taxes. Which in new york, california, the blue states, is significant. As soon as the president signed the tax bill, i signed an emergency order saying that new yorkers could prepay their property taxes so they get the deduction this year. Most of the local governments are being cooperative. The reason why its a scramble is we only had about ten days to prepay. Local governments need to do their final budget so they have an assessment so they can issue a warrant. What you are referring to is the irs said you can only prepay if you know what the amount is. So the local governments had to come up with the actual amount of what next years taxes would be and then new yorkers had to go make those payments before december 31. Under new york and thats the rush that youre seeing. Under new york law, werent new yorkers already allowed to prepay their taxes under new york law . In some areas, you could. In some areas you couldnt, but there was no reason to prepay because it was always deductible. Got it. What this federal bill says is its no longer deductible so you have to prepay. When you look at the tax plan, you basically have said that this is the gop revenge on blue states. You have no republican senators here in new york and in other states that this is going to affect largely. Given that, do you have any recourse as governor of new york to try and challenge this bill . This law . Well, look. First of all, the whole bill, put the political spin aside for a moment, ago . The whole bill was a bait and switch. They started by saying were going to help the middle class. The bill comes out. Its a tax cut for the wealthy and for the rich corporations. And their rationale is we believe were going to give the corporations a 15 windfall and we think theyre going to pass that on in terms of higher wages to the workers. Maybe they do that or maybe they put it in their pocket. Maybe they dividend it out or maybe they buy a house in the south of france. If you actually wanted to make it go to higher wages for workers, you could have put that in the law. You could have said to corporations, were giving you 15 , but we want you to pass that onto the workers by x. 10 , 5 , whatever. They didnt do that. It had nothing with helping the middle class. It was just a tax cut for the corporations and the rich. How did they finance it . By going to the blue states that they dont represent and using them as a piggy bank. That is exactly what they did. I have questions as to the legality of it. It would be like me passing a state law saying republicans pay one tax rate, a higher tax rate, and the democrats pass a lower tax rate. Thats what they did on a nationwide basis. So how do you challenge that . Theyre saying we dont represent in how do you challenge that . Were doing the Legal Research now to see if there is a legal challenge. I think it may very well violate the due process and equal protection laws. It is the most egregious political act i have seen. Not since the civil war have you seen the states this divided. And it was done quickly. It was done without any public review. And now youre seeing the backlash. It doesnt make any sense from a National Point of view either because if you want to stimulate the nationwide economy, why would you send a dagger to the heart of new york and california . Two of the biggest states and two of the biggest economic engines. New york governor andrew cuomo, thank you so much for joining us. Happy new year to you. You, too. Happy holidays. Thank you. And there are fewer staffers at the state department. The United Nations has been put on notice. And were closer than weve ever been to nuclear war with north korea. So why is Rex Tillerson so optimistic . It had been predicted that secretary of state Rex Tillerson wouldnt make it through the first year of the trump administration. Not only is he still around its almost a year hes also touting the administrations Foreign Policy record. Tillerson wrote an op ed in the New York Times talking about the challenges facing the u. S. Around the world, including north korea, russia, iran and isis. Tillerson wrote, in spite of these challenges, i remain optimistic about the power of diplomacy to resolve conflicts and advance american interests. My confidence comes from the knowledge that our efforts are carried out daily by patriotic and dedicated state Department Employees who make sacrifices to serve with patience and persistence. Joining me here is hagar, a former spokesperson for the u. S. Mission to the United Nations, as well as a former spokesperson for the treasury department. Thanks for joining us. Its interesting to see this oped by Rex Tillerson when the state department seems to have had a diminished role over this past year. Less people working there. Diplomacy hasnt seemed to be high on this administrations agenda. A president tweeting out his thoughts about various diplomatic issues around the world. Qatar at one point and then not to mention all of his attacks on north korea and even today on china. What was your take after reading this . So at first, i enjoyed the read. I thought finally for once, after a year, were seeing a Foreign Policy strategy all the priorities of the administration laid out in a very concise manner. With a lot of consistent themes. Pursuing certain goals, most of which are the same as obamas goals, in a more maybe but perhaps in a tougher manner. A lot of these actually are really the same or continuation of obamas policies. So that was all good. At the end i felt that if secretary of state tillerson really feels this way about waking up every day and figuring out how diplomacy can help those who are killed or deprived of their rights they need to put their money where their mouth is. Theyve left a lot of leadership positions vacant. Cut a lot of the budget, obviously. That doesnt really add up to that goal. A lot of the employees, even highlevel employees of the state department, diplomats and whatnot, have a hard time getting access to Rex Tillerson and having meetings with him. Right. And morale is low. Morale is low. The daily times has an oped that flies in the face of a lot of what Rex Tillerson was saying, saying that we dont have the mantel any longer of leading the world. That china is assuming that mantel on a global crusade that the United States once led. Ill read from it. Russia has taken over syrian peace talks. Also once the purview of the American Administration whose officials moscow recently designed to invite im sorry, deigned to invite to negotiations only as observers. France and germany are often the countries that fellow members of nato look to after President Trump wavered on how to support his administration how supportive his administration would be toward the north atlantic alliance. And in the israelipalestinian conflict, the u. S. Wants the only mediator all sides would accept has found itself isolated after trumps decision to declare the u. S. Recognize jerusalem as the capital of israel. So are we still a force on the world stage . We i think we are for now. Its too soon to say that the u. S. Is not a leader, not a leader that people look to. Its why countries are still actively trying to understand what the communications out of that administration are. So i dont want to rush to that too soon. However, i do think if the administration continues on its policy of, you know, pursuing certain unilateral decisions without partners without key allies like france, germany and the uk, how they pursued the decision related to the iran deal or things like that, we risk isolating ourselves even further. Make sense of today for me. On the one hand, tillerson talking about china and the diplomacy in china and praising the import bans and the sanctions in this oped and then the president comes out with a tweet. President trump saying, caught red handed. Very disappointed china is allowing oil to go to north korea. There will never be a friendly solution to to happen. Is this a coordinated Good Cop Bad Cop . I wouldnt expect it to be coordinated. I would say this administration has reflected a lack of coordination on messaging. For this oped, unlikely it was approved by the white house. Does that make it to the president . Probably not, no. When i was at the white house, i mean, there was certain documents that would make it to the president , including op easy. Certainly important ones if they had to do with iran or things like that, one like this, my get is probably not, but probably go as high as the National Security adviser. At least thats the case when i was at the nsc. I find it hard to believe tillersons oped wasnt approved. That said, i dont their the president cares much about the coordination. Well see what happens in 2018. A lot of questions. Thank you for joining us. Glad we could steal you from the 3 00 today. Thanks for having moo e. Coming up next, one more thing. Stay with us. For your heart. Your joints. Or your digestion. So why wouldnt you take something for the most important part of you. Your brain. 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And npr crunched numbers against his past six president sesseay predecessors and he came in dead last. The president has reached a record in his first year and eli stokal points out today in the wall street journal. We havent seen this amount of west wing turnover in 40 years. The president lost the national staff, two directors and a cabinet secretary. And thats just is a handful. Hey, a records a record. Right . Well be right back. I am totally blind. And non24 can make me show up too early. Or too late. Or make me feel like im not really there. Talk to your doctor, and call 8442342424. Every day we hear from families who partnered with a Senior Living advisor from a place for mom to help find the Perfect Place for their mom or dad thank you so much for your assistance in helping us find a place. Mom feels safe and comfortable and has met many wonderful residence and staffers. Thank you for helping our family find our father a new home. 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And President Trumps defense advisers, Michael Flynn saying the team is working to cast the National Security advisers as a liar. In contrast to the many many compliments the president has publicly paid to general flynn. Michael flynn, general flynn is a wonderful man. I think hes been treated very, very unfairly by the media. I think its very, very unfair whats happened to general flynn, the way he was treated and the documents and papers that were illegally, i stress that, illegally leaked. I do feel badly for him. He served the country. He was a general. This man has served for many years. Hes a general. Hes a in my opinion, a