was causing the problems. perhaps going back to the invasion is what led to the problems in the first place. most democrats or many democrats, at least, almost very quickly regretted voting to approve that invasion. i was on the phone yesterday with several different democrats of several different varieties and, you know, to a person it was this is a problem that the maliki government has to address. his shiite dominated government has to figure out a way to work with sunnis and kurds in iraq. we shouldn t even seriously think about assisting them in any kind of way. i think there are some like lynn said who are okay with some limited strikes. you will find democrats and republicans who say, look, if you want to do anything, drone strikes, missile strikes, anything related to military involvement, you ve got to come to congress to get authority. remember, it was only last summer that most of congress resisted calls to take military action against neighboring syria. all right. we ll s
anticipate that there will be some type of decision within a matter of days and not weeks. one more point that i will make according to a senior administration official, the president will likely announce short-term and long-term steps. some of the long-term steps that we might see, beefed up military support of the iraqi government and also an increased presence at the embassy there in iraq. those are some of the options that the president is considering. frances, back to you. kristin welker traveling with the president. we thank you this morning. joining me now lynn sweet and congressional reporter for the washington post ed o keefe. thank you both for being with us this morning. good morning. lynn, let s start with you. are there any options that everyone, we re talking democrats here, republicans, and the white house can agree upon? not right now. this is a war weary congress and, yeah, obama has to worry about his own base of support here. this is the president who was e
they are going to shut down the government over it, they are trying to. right now it looks like that would backlash against them, just like it backlashed against newt gingrich in the 90s. we re talking about the midterms or general elections, because in the midterms african-americans and others tending to vote democrat are less likely to show up and it s harder to generate that same kind of energy. congressman meeks, when you go home, do you hear people talking about these characters? i ve never seen this right wing so virulent, basically trying it to erase obama, kill the baby in its crib with obama care. it s like he s barry bonds. he really didn t hit all those homers, he didn t do it. there s something wrong with it. seems this is what they are trying to do. that s right, but when history looks back, they are going to show the kind of individuals in congress he had
history will reflect that. they re going to show the kind of individuals that were in congress he had to deal with. yet his accomplishments. they re going to show when he came into office, he had three major catastrophic events taking place. the worst financial crisis of which he got us out of, a war in iraq and afghanistan. he passed a health care bill that had been trying to be passed for decades. so the and he did a lot of this against the opposition of individuals who wanted to wipe him off the map. that s going to make his legacy that much stronger and better, i think, in the eyes of history. that s the best i ve heard it. thank you so much. congressman meeks in new york and now that putin stuck his neck out in syria, he s the go-to guy to get the chemical weapons. we ll talk about whether russia can control the mess over there. add maryland to the states where right wingers are pushing secession.
that s the hardest vote in my 15 years in congress, the hardest votes i ve had to take, whether or not we use our military or not. that s a vote of conscience. i think the members of the congressional black caucus were going to utilize their conscience not based upon the friendship with the president. they wanted to make sure to do the right thing. what do you think, clarence. as an objective journalist, was this a lot of fear, i don t want to put a nay vote down? it is a vote of conscience. that s why this issue crossed party lines. you ve got libertarian republicans, they re just as anti-war as the left wing democrats. it s the kind of issue that also stands out by itself too, i think. i don t know if anybody s election prospects are going to rise or fall on this. except obama doesn t have to worry about reelection. let s talk about his election, clarence. you first. we all know watching this thing last summer, the one thing that got people energized to vote in