aside from the personal stuff, hagel didn t talk up in national security meetings, what does his ouster tell us about obama and his policies in the last two years. first, it tells us the world has changed. hagel was brought in as a soul mate for obama, someone who wanted to get out of iraq, out of afghanistan and no new war and the situation has changed. and to shrink the military and kind of not be one of the a cabinet members. now we have the isis problem and the new war president declared. people keep saying no. this is a tough one for obama. he s got to find an authority figure. he has to find somebody who immediately people will say, that s a leader. . wait, wait. we ve seen a couple of top
[ sneeze ] [ male announcer ] truth is not all flu products treat all your symptoms. what? [ male announcer ] nope, they don t have an antihistamine. really? [ male announcer ] really. [ dog whine ] but alka-seltzer plus severe cold and flu speeds relief to these eight symptoms. [ breath of relief ] thanks. [ male announcer ] you re welcome. ready? go. get it! [ male announcer ] can t find theraflu, try alka-seltzer plus for fast liquid cold and flu relief. the book s not out yet but the reviews with coming in. robert gates has a book out kicking up dust in foreign policy circles. he praises many of president obama s policies but also appears to question his personal conviction and steadiness as a war president. that charge has sparked it own criticism including he s taking sides in the civil/military relationship. secretary gates appears to be
the show. i remember during the 2008 election and everything that went with it, we had a group of moderates that came on, and you were one of them. very strong voice. you recently posted your frustration with some republicans, writing that republicans simply can t argue a case without making it personal and making it all boil to hatred of barack obama. are there examples of that? oh, quite a few examples of that. you almost run out of space making up a list these days. i mean, what you re seeing, first of all, i did a piece this week about how you re getting the liberal democrats and republican isolationists, and now also the tea party republicans, all converging on opposing this. the republicans who have started to have to make it all about obama personally, you ve got peggy noonan writes a column and says that obama doesn t look like a war president. harry truman looked like a war president. you ve got charles kroutenhammer
lets take a look how it shapes up in each party, how this vote shapes up right now. lets start by look at the democrat this is a quote from tom cole, republican from oklahoma. this is what he said yesterday. obama hasn t got a chance to win this vote if he can t win the majority of his own party and i doubt he can. he is a war president without a war party. richard wolffe looking at the democratic party, democrats on capitol hill, what do you make of that assessment? lets come back to the british situation for a start. the reason they lost was actually because two things, they were incredibly bad at votes, two or three dozen of the conservatives own majority were on vacation, several of the government minister. you have to be able to count and win votes. when you look at the democratic party clearly a substantial minority that will vote again this resolution. so the only way this gets through is for both sides of congress the majority and minority to come together. you re not going
nuclear program underway and the president announces cheerfully the war s going to end because i m not happy being a war president. well, the question is whether that is those are threats and tho one is denying those are real threats, the question is whether they fall under the rubric of war. i found this fascinating in a couple respects. as you say, there were fewer specifics of change than there were a desire to set a new direction kind of thing. mindset. it felt to me a speech where he s beginning to count back from the end of his presidency. the first time you see that mindset where he s thinking what is the architecture i want to leave behind. and in another way it s kind of striking historically when we ve added power to the national security apparatus, we don t usually retrench it after. it kind of creates and grows longer. this is a speech where he said i want to move in the direction of withdrawing some of the power that the presidency has been afforded post-9/11.