joins us now. what were your impressions on monday as to how his thinking was towards military action versus diplomacy leading into this big moment? well, we almost watched this in realtime unfold, didn t we? i think the president was prepared to make this case, make this argument for the use of military force in this context and then, as we were sitting there, i mean, these events were literally unfolding such that it became everybody s first question in the interview. what about this latest offer from russia to have syria turn over to international inspectors its chemical arsenal? you could see the president is almost in realtime considering it. we saw both of those things last night. our friends at first read and chuck todd made a great observation. the first part of the speech was probably the part they d been writing for weeks. but the last part was, on the other hand, in light of recent developments. it was a little odd because
we re the leaders and the only country that can do this. on the other hand, let s wait, let s delay and see if diplomacy can work. which is fine. but do you really think this diplomacy can work? i think the president was clear and concise last night. because from the beginning remember, he s always said that we prefer and a top priority would be for a political and diplomatic solution. make no mistake, the one thing we can have confidence about is that syria and russia are certainly confident that there was an imminent strike that was going to come down on assad s head in response to this chemical weapons attack. and that is what brought them to the table to propose securing assad s chemical weapons under international control. and we wouldn t be here if not for that threat. congresswoman, where we are right now is in something of a political muddle. what if the president decides that diplomacy is not working? does he have to come back to
there are serious doubts about whether he would carry through. on a much harder issue, the iran issue. in damascus, they want to they think they have found, i assume, a ploy to keep america from bombing, which is to say, let s just talk about moving our chemical weapons out forever. so you have different reactions in different places. but we re in a pause right now. we re in a real strategic pause. well, the question i have, mark, is there a real threat of force if we now know that if he had a vote in congress now, he would lose and lose probably the rest of his second term? dmesing agenda, all the rest of it. how real is the threat of force if he s going to go back to congress? or, if provoked by syria or the diplomacy fails, would he go it alone without coming back to congress? he told savannah the other day he s undecided. perhaps he still is about whether he could or would strike with that congress authority. it s hard to see how he gets back to momentum regardless of what ha