more robust response when assad began his onslaught on the syrian people. she was the chief architect of the obama foreign policy. when it came to syria they completely dropped the ball. let s bring in our panel to talk about the growing refugee crisis in europe. jenna goldberg, senior editor at national review. amy walter, national editor for the cook political report. and syndicated columnist charles krauthammer. amy i ll start with you there. you saw the political bit of backdrop we re getting with the 2016 contenders talking about did this happen on secretary clinton s watch? of course the gop candidates are going to try to make some hay with that. absolutely. and to make the case again that obama s policy in the middle east is disastrous and there s no center there. i thought it was very interesting, though, during hillary clinton s interview she wanted a mored i think it forceful response in syria, making that distinction of course with the president, we may hear it again.
years. that s why i advocated for a more robust response when assad began his onslaught on the syrian people. she was the chief architect of the obama foreign policy. when it came to syria they completely dropped the ball. let s bring in our panel to talk about the growing refugee crisis in europe. jenna goldberg, senior editor at national review. amy walter, national editor for the cook political report. and syndicated columnist charles krauthammer. amy i ll start with you there. you saw the political bit of backdrop we re getting with the 2016 contenders talking about did this happen on secretary clinton s watch? of course the gop candidates are going to try to make some hay with that. absolutely. and to make the case again that obama s policy in the middle east is disastrous and there s no center there. i thought it was very interesting, though, during hillary clinton s interview where she mentioned i think it was twice that she wanted a more forceful response in syria, making
open on this one. we heard from hillary clinton and we also saw statement after statement after statement coming from the republican candidates. scott walker just one of them saying that this nuclear agreement will be remembered as one of america s worst diplomatic failures, and that was echoed by and large all the way down the line. what you don t see in these statements, kevin, the alternative. where s the alternative coming from gop candidates. i think if you go out into the early primary states of iowa and new hampshire, the number-one issue the economy but the number two issue is national security and foreign policy. i think it goes without saying that many of those voters in those states that these guys like scott walker, jeb bush and others are trying to provide their support, they are not happy with the obama foreign policy agenda so there is very little risk to go out there and drive a hard contrast and criticize any deal the president
is not popular. i think we d also have if you look at president obama s numbers on foreign policy, on national security, they are not good. that s why hillary is coldly calculating right now some of her remarks about this. because if this deal starts to go south, the iranians start to break it and there s not enough verification enforcement, you will see hillary clinton start to pull away from president obama because she knows what many republicans know, which is that the president is not very popular on the issue of national security. so republicans are in a good position when they run a hard contrast, criticizing what they don t like about the last six years but you re right on the fact that they have to provide an alternative vision. what a national security foreign policy agenda is going to look like for the future. kevin madden, patti solis doyle. welcome. thank you for being with us. great to be with you as always. you class up the joint. it s a terrifying ordeal for
assistance so they can defend themselves. that is the centerpiece of the obama foreign policy. giving assistance, providing close air support say in the case of the iraqis but leaving it at that because ultimately they want to say that it s not our problem we want to help you but it s your fight and they want to lead the fight to the people that are directly involved. that was the position also shared by the secretary general with me today. kevin as always, thank you. you re welcome. and a shocking admission from the pentagon. chairman of the joint chiefs of staff general martin dempsey admitting they were totally surprised by the rise of isis. for all the contingency planning that you do here routinely at the pentagon, were there plans for how to iraq to the fall of mosul to isis? no, there was not. there were several things that surprised us about isil. and the on the record political panel is here.