troops to saudi arabia and still can t answer questions about ka showing ee. peel have political considerations and foreign policy considerations. the president operates in a personal way which no one can figure out. remember his personal attorney representing a turkish national charged in court with helping facilitate a multi billion dollar sanctions dodging arrangement for the iranians. rudy worked hard to get him off the hook, met in person with erdogan. he urged the president to let him off the hook. that didn t happen. instead, he took a plea deal and laid out how the sanctions dodging scheme worked. that connection between one of the president s close friends and advisers and someone that close to erdogan, look, it is relevant context. brendan, rudy, how easy a
lower levels. there could be some element of that if you want to give the president the benefit of the doubt. also reminds me in one of his books, donald trump in his business life, talked about wanting to come in and have a loose agend aany given day. come in and wait for things to develop and react. some people find that appalling. some find that, yeah, that s what a chief executive ought to do. i think that s what we re getting. david gregory, you covered george w. bush forever. just how different is this schedule than w s was? quite a bit different. we ve seen presidents who get hammered for spending too much time on the golf course but most presidents adhere to an actual schedule that reflects the rigor of their decision-making and of an actual process. a process where they are in meetings with other principals going through foreign policy considerations, domestic considerations and events and so forth. there are those around trump and supporters of trump who would
foreign policy considerations and your foreign policy interests without regard to the hostages. we don t want other countries to be able to engage in hostage taking and therefore use them as human shields. on the other hand, you don t want to let your foreign policy prevent you from bringing every single american home. it s almost not just american, nicolle. it s biblical. the mission of returning captives is as old as humanity itself. you heard austin tice s mom describe it as a humanitarian mission. she s obviously trying to do what you describe, separate it from american foreign policy, because for her, this has nothing to do with policy, she wants to get her son home. can a president have conversations that are offline and say, hey, you know, let s have this conversation or this negotiation separate from our other issues? does the president have that power? does the president use his power in that way, ever? it s hard to know. i haven t seen presidents personally use that power
did with the tice parents and not be moved, first of all not be heartbroken, but also not be moved to action. you really have to pursue the mission of returning hostages without regard to your foreign policy considerations. and you have to pursue your foreign policy interests without worrying about hostages. you don t want countries to take hostages and use them as human shields. on the other hand, you don t want to let your foreign policy prevent you from being every single american home. it s not only americans, nicolle, it s biblical. the mission of returning captives is as old as humanity itself. his mom is obviously trying to do what you describe, separate it from american foreign policy, because for her, this has nothing to do with policy, she wants to get her son home. can a president have conversations that are offline and say, hey, you know, let s have this conversation or this
family. that th was in pring of 2011 as we were planning the bin laden operation. if he would have been in country during that operation we feared he would have been killed. we needed to get him home. sometimes you have to really rely on those relationships and that personal outreach. how does an agency like the cia sort of compartmentalize the tics talked about how they d had some positive interactions with the syrians. obviously we re in a very tense posture with syria over their atrocities in aleppo and other parts of their civil war. but how does an agency like the cia or the pentagon compartmentalize and try to do everything to get someone s child home while also maintaining our country s posture against another country? you can t help but watch a video like the interview that lester did with the tice parents and not be moved, first of all not be heartbroken, but also not be moved to action. so you really have to pursue the mission of returning hostages without regard to you