real sense of urgency in trying to repair any damage that s been done to the special relationship over the course of president trump s presidency and to try to at least agree upon the contours of some kind of a bilateral trade agreement because that trade agreement will really be essential to the uk as it finds itself increasingly potentially adrift in a post brexit world. so lots of political machinations here, jim, and it will be very interesting to see who indeed the president does meet with and what effect that will have on their political capital. brexit politicans, it said there would be a whole host of bilateral trade agreements. those haven t come to fruition yet. we ll add douglas brinkley no the conversation, cnn presidential historian. i want to ask you to put this in historical context. we re used to this president being very personal and at times petty, particularly via his
it s a crash out, forget it, there will be friction-full trade. queue, lines. ports, you know, we don t know aircraft, will your passport work. you know, for many businesses, they may collapse. so people in the uk who support brexit, not necessarily people who are angry about trade agreements, but they sort of think that in the end, the uk will do better off without europe and the european experiment hasn t worked all that well. so the stuff you describe seems to make life easier, frictionless trade, goods coming in tariff free, the movement of people. why do so many people think it s not working and they re getting off the european ship? there are many people who support brexit who have a kind of nostalgia for almost an imperial past when britannia ruled the waves. like their equivalent of make
want? she ll go to europe and said, can you give us any compromises. it is a complete mess. it almost makes what s happening in washington look pleasant. it is a complete mess. one of the problems is bill speaks of two tribes. it s not even quite that simple. there are members of labor who support brexit, conservatives who support brexit. the cross currents are pretty difficult to pin down, aren t they? absolutely right. this is the problem. there are splipts across shot through politics and families and the labor party and conservative party have been split for years. it has been split for 40 years. first of all, david cameron trying to neutralize his
provide that sense of awareness to the american people? i think the in retrospect and it is always easier to say this in retrospect, the obama administration should have done more to alert people, but, you know, it was kind of unimaginable in the beginning, that the russians, even though they had done this in the ukraine, which i visit frequently, and in germany, and even though they might have been involved in the effort in england to get the british people to support brexit, that is getting out of the eu, it was somehow unimaginable that they would try this in the united states. yeah this was kind of crossing a red line. and i think americans were simply not aware that this degree of influence maneuvering was going on. and you are right, it is always so easy to armchair, quarterback after the fact. right that s a great point you bring up. i want to ask you this, though, you have done extensive reporting including on wars, this is information war faes