director, now an nbc national security analyst, john brennan what is the president s culpability in how we got here, and what is his opportunity for, if any, putting the toothpaste back in the tube well, it was clear that donald trump didn t understand the iran nuclear agreement he just wanted to abregate it, tear it up, because it s something his predecessor, president obama, had negotiated. i think quite successfully what this administration should have done was try to build upon it they could have even adjusted some of the terms of it, but to basically just tear it up then to declare this economic war, imposing these very, very onerous sanctions on iran, not just u.s. sanctions, but insisting that third parties, in fact, honor those sanctions. so i think iran has made it very clear over the last several months that the status quo is not acceptable and it s not going to just allow this to continue and so now mr. trump has gotten what i think he was after which was putting iran in t
coverage on fox news these last few nights. they re talking about the coming disarming of america, they re coming for your guns they re telling their audience. tonight they had a graphic up behind the anchor that said dictators in training and it showed some of the democrats. the question to you is, how do you put the toothpaste back in the tube after running behind something like the new deal to get those voters in new hampshire, to get those voters in iowa who come out and vote in democratic primaries, and then say to a general election audience, oh, we re not really after your cheeseburgers, drinking straws, or your guns. i don t know that you can, brian. i don t know that you can sort of completely disown what you say in a primary. you can try to nuance it, obviously. i think the interesting question is this. we are in a different era of politics now with the election of donald trump in 2016 and the
major world historical event that we re living through right now. and both china and russia and in their different ways are using soft power throughout the world to expand their influence and power and to bolster their economies and to chart the way forward and donald trump has no understanding of the power and doesn t understand the relationships he doesn t understand how to build them, how to sustain them. and he s he is leaving us on the sidelines. it s an abdication really of the united states position in the world, and i agree with richard haass. i don t think you can put all of this toothpaste back in the tube after trump. assuming he s defeated in 2020 and a new president takes over, assuming it s not bernie sanders and someone who would be at all
perceived on the world stage. and it s incredibly dangerous. it is to what others were saying how do you put the toothpaste back in tube? you cannot. so this is going to have a long lasting effect. when you think about the climate change session that he missed, you know, he was able to tweet about fox news polls and make time to tweet about regis, he was able to make time to tweet about nuking hurricanes but he could not attend a climate change session while the amazon is literally burning and when we talk about that empty chair at that meeting it really symbolizes not only that trip but the presidency. it is abandoned leadership that is what we re seeing from this president of the united states. and that s frightening because once again, it s not disruptive, it s destructive. well, richard haass, let s go back to what lanhee was talking about when you look at our relationship with china, the
voters. john h. r. halderman we died left behind a lot of things but mostly the expression you can t put the toothpaste back in the tube. keeping in mind we have a g-7 coming up days from now where our president is going to r represent our country. i think the big thing that can t be put back in the tube is the president requiring this kind of obeisance from foreign leaders, from friends basically. you don t ask you friends for too much. and he went out and basically asked benjamin netanyahu to sacrifice a ton of israel s pride. to take a dive so that donald trump could feel good for a day, so he could get one in on ilhan omar and rashida talib. what israel had to sacrifice today was basically the jewish people for thousands of years, the jewish people have survived the worst tyrants of the world. and today they had to pretend