Detailed text transcripts for TV channel - CNN - 20181221:14:52:15 archive.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from archive.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
discussion of what will it mean if president trump actually goes forward and causes the defense department to cut by 5%. that would be about $30 billion. i m about to have a discussion with senators joni ernst and jeanne shaheen, both on the armed services committee, about the way forward and should the u.s. be positioned in the middle east. there was an interesting survey showing that half of americans do not belief the last 17 years of war in iraq and afghanistan have come to anything. they believe that we have failed in the middle east. so those discussions ongoing. you mentioned bret baier s interview with, a rare interview with secretary mattis. he sat down with him just moments ago, and here s what mattis said about russia. mr. putin is clearly a slow learner. we re dealing with someone that we simply cannot trust. has the relationship worsened since you ve been defense secretary? there is no doubt the relationship has worsened. he tried again to muck around in
the description of him being a pilot shot down and rescued by that sub marine in the pacific submarine in the pacific conflict. i think secretary mattis put it best when he paid tribute to president bush just moments ago. here in the valley where the spirit of the gipper lives on, we cannot begin here today without acknowledging the passing of that true patriot, president george bush. he certainly, in the department of defense, we saw him as one of our own, for obvious reasons. one of the youngest aviators in our history. reporter: a lot of discussion here at the forum about how to return the youth of america to this sense of service, the kind of service that president bush embodied. dana? dana: and i think you ll see it, jen, in a lot of the veterans, from republicans and democrats that were just elected to this new congress. there s many more of them, and i think they follow in those footsteps very well, indeed.
that s a pentagon that wants to do the tactical side. the question a lot of people across the country, not just in political circles, but people across the country have asked is why general mattis went along with this, given the respect he has for the troops, given what he s given to the country himself, why did he go with this? i understand he s a chain of command guy, but where was general mattis in all this and how does he feel about the idea of sending troops to the border? so you know when you look for artful legal justification of something that you don t really think there s a legal justification for, what mattis has done is he s gone back into history and say this is similar to what wilson did. to my question and response to what, and people ask me that, it s like, what do you expect mattis to do? do you want him to resign over this? so, yes, it s a salute and go on way. there s always a historical precedent that he can cite. but mattis has embraced this
everybody. it makes it essential that somebody meetings with mattis would know that what mattis is saying is actually what u.s. policy is? how do you think is going to happen. he s backed up and that s his real problem rate now. when tillerson was there, mattis and tillerson was kind of together and felt like they could speak for the president at one point. and i think now he s clashing with the president s top advisors and he can t speak for the president. and now the president has publishically, publicly said this. so the question for mattis that i m sure they re asking abroad just as people were asking me in this country about how sessions is, how long can he last.