Wars and occupation and bad foreign policy, mostly by our own government. What does it mean daytoday . I write stuff, i speak, i talk to people. Who pays you . Phyllis i work for the institute of policy studies. Its been around since the early 60s. We raise money probably from foundations and probably from individuals and we dont take any government money or corporate money. When people give you money, what do they want from you . Phyllis usually what they want is access to information. Isis has been a good example. Who is isis . The reason i wrote a book about isis was because the book kept asking me where can i get some basic stuff . I dont need to be in next bird. I only need to be i only need basic step in basic stuff. We cannot rely on Mainstream Media the way we used to be able to rely on it. The internet provides a huge amount of information but sorting through it, it is hard to know what is reliable and what is shady stuff. So you go to people that you trust and you share your views, maybe about the way to change the world is to build vague social movements against war, inequality, racism. Ips over the years has worked with all those movements. I think that is what people want. When did the media give you what you wanted . Phyllis im not sure that is true. When i was a kid, everybody trusted Walter Concha right walter cronkite. He was condemned after he criticized the war and we the war in vietnam. Its not about trusting individual journalists. Hard, tried toy do their best, but it is a system that doesnt work area well. It is owned by john corporations also own a lot of war industries. Is have a Major Network that owned by the same corporation that owns general electric, which is one of the big military contractors. That cant help but affect how they cover wars in the use of those military goods. Brian they did get out of it. They sold it. Phyllis eventually. Ryan lets go to brian was go to your book. Lets go to your book. Understanding isis in. E new global war on terror what is the difference between a sunni and a sheer . Phyllis it is a good question, although i dont know that is the most important question to understand the complex situation we deal with. It goes back to the seventh century, the prophet mohammed. All the insxpert on and outs of the ideologically. Over whos an argument should take over after the prophet died. Some said it should be a direct family. Another said it should be the closest person working with him and should continue that line. That was the beginning of the split. It doesnt really matter. The actual theological differences are not as important as the political consequences of those differences. Among other things, when you look at the civil war in syria, which is now seven separate wars that are all been fought to the last syrian, one of those wars is a power struggle in the region for who is going to be the Regional Power between saudi arabia and iran. Another is a sectarian war between sunni and shia. And that also was saudi arabia and iran and some of the other forces in the region that they support in syria and elsewhere on opposite sides. So it becomes a political struggle as much as a religious struggle. Brian so how much of what we have seen happen in the last 18 years would we would be happening if there wasnt this split between the sunnis and the shia . Phyllis i think all of it would still be happening. It might look a different, but i think the origins of all of this sartorial with the search for power, for military bases, for foreign occupations of a number of sorts. I think all of those things are far more important than the sunnishia divide in actually creating the split and the problems in the region. Brian since you have had this book on the market, understanding isis any new global war on terror, what is the reaction you have gotten from people who have read it . Phyllis the book has only been out for a few weeks so i havent gotten too much response yet. It is probably similar to the response to articles that are right, which is basically, boy, do i need to know all this . Do i need to know this detail . And i say, absolutely not. Thats why the book is a separate frugally asked questions were people can stick around and just read a few separate frequently asked questions where people can stick around i just read a few. It is as much to understand who is isis. What are their origins . What do they believe . Why are they so violent . I describe all those things. But what is the u. S. Policy regarding isis . Why isnt it working . Can we really go to war against terrorism . Are we doing war wrong or is it wrong to say there should be a all . Gainst terrorism at those are the questions that in some ways are the most important and will be the most useful for people who pick up the book. Brian the isis folks have turned out to be pretty good with video and audio. Phyllis i think so. Brian people that know more about it than i do say they are well produced. We have seen some of this before but just set up the feeling that you have when you see the isis group and then have you come back and expense of a this. [video clip] i call on my friends, family and loved ones to rise up against the real killers, the u. S. Government. For what will happen to me is a result of their complacency criminology. A message to my beloved parents. Save me some dignity. Dont accept any meager compensation for my death from the same people who effectively hit the last nail on my cop and with their on mike coffman in their recent on my coffin in a recent aerial attack. You have been in the forefront of the islamic state. Way tofor out of your interfere. Your military has caused casualties. You are no longer fighting an insurgency. We are an islamic army and a state that has been accepted by a large number of muslims worldwide. Brian what do you think of what you saw . Phyllis horrifying. It is absolutely horrifying. Their ability to bring that image show up close and personal is what makes it so horrific. The reality is, if you compare the numbers of people isis has killed to the numbers of People Killed in the u. S. Occupation of iraq, the war in afghanistan, it doesnt come close. But that isnt the only comparison you can make. When it is this up close and personal, it has a very specific human affect. Even because i know what comes, even if i dont watch it. I think most people do. But there is a reason for putting this kind of horrifying reality on video and showing it to people. And it showed power makes them look powerful and strong. Are clearly some people attracted to that kind of a violence. Thankfully, not very many. And third, perhaps the most important, is this is what drives what we used to call the cnn factor. Maybe it should be called the twitter factor. Of news and policy. It outrageous people. And when people are outraged, they demand that the government do something. And the something, unfortunately, is almost always military. So it drives a policy of responding to this kind of horrific act with war. Which doesnt work. Kills far more people than it prevents being killed. And puts us in the position of being the worlds oppressor to so many people are on the world. But this is so often the decision because there is no Good Alternative that are considered politically viable. It may be viable in terms of doing a job, but not politically viable because it doesnt look powerful enough. And by creating this kind of outrage, these actions, these horrific torture videos, the killing, the beheadings, the burning, this pushes people to demand their governments go to work go to war over there. Which is what isis wants. They want our troops over there to be targets. They dont want isis to come here. And mostno evidence intelligence officials have said that, there is no evidence that they are looking to create a terror action in the United States. Their goal is to create, what he just said, a state, an islamic , in territoryhate that we once knew as part of iraq and part of syria. And it is a very specific and a very local struggle. Brian here is a map that is provided by the military. It shows where the strikes have been. It is beth in syria on top and down below in iraq. And you say thats those strikes dont have any impact. Phyllis i think certain strikes will have an impact on certain times. I am not saying there is no effect at all. But the idea that we can somehow on terrorism out of existence simply is a fallacy. You dont bomb terrorism. You bomb people. You bomb countries. You bomb cities. You may hit some terrorists. And for everyone that you kill, you are creating new enemies in their sons, their daughters come other children, their tribe, the religion, their village, the city, their country. I think when we ignore that we know that. Policymakers will admit that if you asked them about it. But it doesnt seem to change the fact that come as often as we hear president obama say there is no military solution, what we see is military action after military action. So any specific airstrike might get the right person. More often, it is not. But even if it does, the consequences of that right action it got the person it was aiming at that person may have been turned in for a bounty. They mean a be the right person at all. If they are, they still have a family. They have children. They have a wife. They have daughters. They have sons. They have people who live with them. People who love them. And when we kill them, chances are there family doesnt think they are a terrorist. Particularly because on most all of these strikes hit the ball in their homes or in their cars hit people in her homes are in their cars, when they are sleeping or driving or not or driving, not when they are actually fighting. So the moment they are killed, they are been a father. They are being a neighbor. And the response is you killed my father. You killed my neighbor. Not, thankfully, you killed my terrorist. Brian paul bremmer and president obama made the following comments over the last several years. I want to get your personal reaction to what they both said. [video clip] gentlemen, we got him. [cheers] president obama good evening. Tonight, i can report to the American People into the world that the United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama Bin Laden, the leader of al qaeda, and a terrorist users possible for the murder of thousands of innocent men, women and children. Thats nearly 10 years ago a bright september day was darkened by the worst attack on the American People in our history. Phyllis you know, the killing of Saddam Hussein and the killing of Osama Bin Laden, if we look at it historically, the threatons in iraq, the of terrorism, the actual terrorist attacks have gotten worse, not better since it were killed. So the notion that that somehow is something to cheer about, i saddamember the day that hussein was killed. I was in jordan. I remember hearing have people it. Ed about it was very different from the kind of cheering out as hearing from the united. Dates. Brian what did they say . People from the United States. Brian what did they say. Phyllis they were not fans of hussein. But since the overthrow of his government, they lost the stability that accompanied the fact that it was a very repressive regime if you did to speak against the government. And that is a serious problem that i dont think u. S. Policy makers took into account. There is a sense, because we identify someone as a terrorist and, objectively yes, Osama Bin Laden was a terrorist. Saddam hussein not so much. A repressive dictator, yes, but a terrorist, no. Our view,hey were, in they were that one thing and that one thing only. For people in the region, people who are closer to them than we are, they are many things. It is a much more nuanced understanding. We do not understand nuance very well in this country. Brian what about the reaction of president obama . What do you think of him . Phyllis today, i am very proud of president obama for the agreement with iran, which took a lot of political courage. It shouldnt have. There should never have to be political courage to say we support the primacy over war. This was a huge victory for negotiation and diplomacy over war. The fact that president obama had to use Political Capital and had to be brave is a real terrible statement about the state of our political reality in this country. But he was brave. He was courageous. So i plug him for that. I applaud him so i applaud him for that. I applaud him for the moves in cuba. So this last period, i have very proud to have voted for president obama. Brian so why is it brave to lift sanctions or eventually lift sections on cuba why is it great to make this decision on iran . Phyllis it shouldnt have to be brave and it should be brave. It should be normal. Brian but you said it is brave. Phyllis brave politically because there is a political price to be paid because of the right wing character of our politics where there are hardline lobbies. Lobby, which was really the anticuba lobby, the antifidel lobby based in miami, who are much meeker these days week as it didnt transfer to the next generation. Brian let me ask you this. He didnt do anything his first term. He is not going to run for an office again. I go back to why is it brave for him to make a decision in the last two years in his presidency that will not have an end have an impact on him at all. Phyllis i think in the real world, in this washington bubble that you and i both live in, there is courage that is required. There shouldnt be. But he is 70 who wants he is going to have a political career after the presidency. He will be running for office. But maybe he wants to be i dont know what he wants to be. But some of it involves in universities and corporate boards, unfortunately. Not criticizing corporations. Who knows what he is going to want to but he is going to be a young man wanting to do something useful, something interesting, something challenging. So he doesnt want to completely undermined his own political reputation with his own party, for instance. I wish that we would have a president who said, you know what, i have been elected to do wars, dohings, end what i can to end racism in this country. I am going to do things that my party is what you hate. And that is just the weights were to be. If i dont want a second term, so be it. I wish we had somebody with that kind of courage. Barack obama has not been that president. But we have the president that we have and he has been in this context politically brave in the last immediate period. He has done some pretty terrible things in the last period as well. There have been continuing airstrikes and drone attacks. He has escalated the drone war too far more countries than george bush dreamed of. The fact that he has continued responding to acts of terrorism with war means he is continuing the policy of george w. Bush. It was not only a failure. It was in my view a crime. I spoke not too long ago at Hofstra University that was hosting the official conference on the presidency of george w. Bush. Panel, i saidning that i thought george w. Bush belonged on trial in the hague for war crimes. I believe thats true. I hope that president obama will do more to distinction himself from that legacy of his predecessor. Brian back in march i want to run a clip of tomaselli, the advisor. Nior press he lay down the accomplishments of the bush administration. [video clip] tall, poure poor in in for structure military assets, essential services, mass looting, a lack of indigenous secured a forces, the iraq mission also realized a range of success is not sufficiently promoted by the administration and remotely ignored by the media. The training of new Iraqi Security forces began within weeks of the creation of the cpa, which enabled anybody up to the grade of colonel to reapply to a new professional army. Ultimately 80 of the officers armye ncos in the new were from the old army were better trained, better paid, and better equipped. The currency transitioned to a single stable unit within the first six months. It took us two years to do that and postworld war ii germany. Oil production increased. Buildings were rebuilt, good hospitals and health care centers. Systems are created to facilitate an election in an incredibly challenging and degrading security environment. Brian what do you think of it from a philosophical point . How is it you can think so vastly different . Phyllis i found it interesting that, unlike all of the other conferences on the presidency and they have one for every president in history this is the only one where the president , the secretary of state, the secretary of defense none of them showed up. This is the first time. Thats what you have a junior grade pr flack who was on the lead panel because he was the highestranking official they could get. I think that says something about the philosophical basis. There is a reason george bush doesnt want to appear. Not just that he doesnt want to debate me. I doubt that was the issue. I think the issue was they dont want to remind people when jeb bush is running for president that his brother was responsible for the devastation of a country. Brian go back to the question i asked about what you think happens to two different human beings, two different groups of people when they think so differently about war and the protection of the American People . Phyllis for me, the single word that is most important is internationalism. I dont think of myself first as an american. I think of myself first as an internationalist. My country, the country i was privileged to be born into, is the most powerful, the most wealthy country that has ever existed in the history of the world. We have more power than the roman empire ever imagined. We have more money than anyone had ever dreamed of. We have more of everything. What we dont have is care for our own people. 20 of our populations children are living in poverty in the wealthiest country by such a normas scale the such an enormous scale. The vast wealth disparity in thats not just unfortunate. That is criminal. It is absolutely criminal. Brian why . Phyllis why does it happen . It is because powerful lobbies, powerful corporations, economic power we can trace the history back in a postworld war ii period where most of the developed world had been devastated by the war. The u. S. Had gold from the gold rush and it had not been attacked. We were the only one of the major powers that had not been devastated by war. And, boy, did we take it vantage of it. Brian what would you have done back in 9 11, had you been the first woman president in the United States and you are fac