From fire and fury to fear. Many of these claims are coming in Bob Woodwards new book titled fear. Its already one of the years best sellers and its not even on sale yet. The moment these excerpts came out, the book soared to number one on amazon and it has been there ever since, this book is not budging from the top of the list. Solely based on preorders, its the biggest book of 2018. It will actually be released to the public on tuesday. Heres the thing about trumps reaction to the book, by raging against woodward and claiming he might have made up stories and lying about woodwards r reputation, trump seems like hes proving the thesis of the book. Bob woodwards track record. He had the same problem with other president s. Hes discredited other president s there. Obviously nobody is perfect, bob woodward is not perfect, but his reputation is very strong, not just in washington, but across the country, this is the 19th gobook that woodwards has either written or cowritten. Trump has tweeted against the book not once but eighth time, boosting the preorders. This is what happened with michael wolf and fire and furry, with ammarosas book. And now with woodwards book. Woodward is saying his book is a wakeup call for the public. You look at the operation of this white house and you have to say, lets hope to god we dont have a crisis, people who work for him are worried that he will sign things or give orders that threaten Financial Security or the National Security of the world. Who do you believe, the president or bob woodward, that is an ongoing argument. But is it an argument that the president is going to win . What about the issues of credibility here . And what about the astonishing claims in the book and in the new oped. And lets talk about it, it was someone who knew the president way back when, tony schwartz, he was the coauthor of the art of the deal and schwartz now an outspoken critic of the president. Tony, thanks for being here. Since were talking about books, we wanted to talk to someone who worked with the president on a book several years ago. What is your reaction to the tall revelations in woodwards book . Its textbook trump, he makes the shift to whatever position is necessary to try to undermine the credibility of something thats critical to him, he will do so in a way that relatively few people will by deceiving, lying, deflecting, distracting, anything he can do to keep people from focusing on what the book says. So hell say whatever he has to say in the moment, just to get through the day . To get through the week . Hes trying to control the narrative, as we know, hes trying to shift the narrative, whats happening, though, is that he now has people on every side of him, he will pretty much say that he doesnt trust anybody anymore. He has everybody that he has occupied inside the white house saying youre pretty nuts. And do you think too many journalists are i think this book the woodward book is renewing and reviving those concerns, but are they being taken seriously enough about the press corps . I think you and i have taken this seriously in the past, and the idea that its kind of an antidying way to describe not fit for office. But the reason that hes not fit for office, is that hes mentally unstable, hes a deeply disturbed guy. But youre not saying that with a doctors license, a psychiatrist license. You dont need to be a psychiatrist to see that when someone lies that whether we come up with a terms psychological in nature, the bottom line is this guy is not stable, hes not logical, hes not rational, and he is indeed as you say unfit to be president. Let me say with regard to whats in the woodward book, the claim that his aids think hes a threat to the country, a thread to National Security. Is woodward uncovering anything new here . When you read the excerpts were you saying whats the fuzss. Its a big fuss when people are around him every day fully support his policies and nonetheless say hes unfit for office. That is a huge piece of news and it should be of interest of anybody whos sitting on the fence who if they believe in his policies, it is worth supporting him. So a reporter from the white house who you you have said has been so john kellys denied some of the quotes, mattis has denied some of the quotes. I have been in situations where sources will tell the truth anonymously, and then theyll lie on the record. I think every journalist has determined that. The but we should acknowledge that they have denied some of the claims. Well, fine, acknowledge that they have denied some of the claims, but recognize that these are people who have consistently been not just by woodward, but by others noted ore or recognizd by others. It forces people into a portion where they lie in order to keep their job, so if you are john kelly or youre jim mattis and you have come out on 50 or 60 of them and say i didnt do that. You do that because if you dont do that, you dont have a job. Lets go to some of the responses from trump world to this book, lets put on some of the uncredible reactions to the book, people who are familiar with the book say its a work of fiction, that he just talked to disgruntled sources, maybe he just made up the stories, maybe he is just a democratic operative and an idiot. Mattis and kelley issued denials, and its to change the subject. First of all, those five of six things and ten more are a fog machine, its part of the fog machine that trump and his people create every day in every moment. No, i think whats happening is that his credibility, which was never very high is progressively diminishing, even among those who are generally supportive of his policies. So i think this is a cumulative impact, im very low at this point to say its a clear turning aint, its an infleck shurn poi inflection point, but i think day by day he undermines his own likelihood to stay in office. A quick break here on reliable sources, the one and only carl bernstein, his reaction to how one of his long time friends and collaborators bob woodward is being treated by the white house. Plugs ts the reaction to th new oped coming up right after the break. vo combine the right things. And something amazing happens. Thats our inspiration for fancy feast medleys. Wild salmon primavera. Tastes amazing. Also in pate. Fancy feast medleys. You want things done right. Thats why we test all of our paints and stains for months. Or even years. We dedicate 175,000 square feet to getting it wrong. Because you deserve paint thats done right. Thats proudly particular. Benjamin moore. The standard for paint professionals. Only at local paint and hardware stores. 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He talked about what he hopes people will take away from this book. Lets take a look at what woodward said. This one was in the belly of the beast. And what did you conclude about the beast . That People Better wakeup to whats going on. And to what woodward is saying in this book and what he wants the public to know . Carl, do i have you . Im sorry i think i couldnt hear you, brian. Youre a little bit far away from me today. I was asking for your reaction to what woodward was say about t the fact that the public needs to wake up. This needs to be a wakeup call. I think thats true because this book is an astonishing book with detail piled upon detail, with memoranda in which people in the administration of the United States that people need to be saved from donald trump and his presidency, saved from his ignorance, saved from his lies, saved from his unwillingness to do the hard work of being president. Its an unprecedented situation, its very different than either bobs other books on the president s and presidencies including our books together about nixon presidency. Nixon presidency in its final days was teetering with an unstable president. This president , if you read this book carefully has been teetering from the beginning with an unstable president. And there are lots of question about how woodward obtained this information. This is part of what hes said on cbs. This is one thing carl, because hes doing the same thing that you and bob did together during watergate, going to peoples homes late at night. Listen. In one case, i called somebody at 11 00 at night and said i would like to talk. Yeah, yeah, yeah, well get to it. And i said, well, how about now . And he said now . Its 11 00 at night. I said, im four minutes away. Okay, come over for a while. Come on over. Carl, what can you tell us about woodwards style and his reporting methods . The methodology that both of us still use today is what we developed reporting on nixon which is to go to source after source after source who has firsthand information about what he or i is covering and that especially applies to the president of the United States and to confirm by going to source after source and getting different accounts and triangulating them to come up with what bob and i long ago called the best obtainable version of the truth and what you see in this book is such a convincing this is not about one person in the trump orbit calling the president of the United States a moron or an idiot, this is about being in the room with the president of the United States where he demonstrably is not capable of being the president of the United States. Take a look at the south korean situation. The way one meeting is described, the president asks general mattis why, why are we in korea . What are these 28,000 troops doing there . We need to just bring them home, get them the hell out of there, they cost us too much money, and mattis has to say to the president , we have them there to prevent world war iii. There is this methodology that we started with a back in the nixon days, it works because its what real reporting is. And remember that as with nixon, with trump even more so, he has tried to make conduct of the press the issue, the conduct of bob woodward instead of the conduct and lying of that he has engaged in. You got to ask yourself, look, who are you going to believe here . A reporter with a record that has established what every presidency is really about, the basic information we know going back 45 years, or a president of the United States, who has made compulsive lying the hallmark of his presidency. And the through line with both the book fear and that shocking New York Times oped is that President Donald Trump is trying to make the press the issue. Let me ask you about the issue of the oped, we should be really clear that the New York Times newsroom where you work and the oped page is not near you, not even on the same floor of you. It but what i have seen about the oped is the anonymous nature of the oped writing and the anonymous nature of the woodward reporting, why should the American People trust Anonymous Sources . The New York Times has some of the most tough, strict, vetting processes for our sources, particularly on the oped side or the editorial side for any kind of anonymity that is provided. The white house who covered National Iraq war reporting, they know who this is. What about your boss . Dean mckay, the newsroom bost, does dean mckay know who the oped writer is . He doesnt know the identity. Thats the fire wall between many things, between the Editorial Department and the news department. Is he trying to find out who the source is . The are your report errs investigate i reporters investigating . If you find out who it is, are you allowed to print it . If we find out who it is, i cant get into what we would ultimately publish, but the decisions that the Editorial Department has made to the vetting to the anonymity granted is different from the reporting. The key here thing is just the deliberative nature of this, and you know this, brian, when anonymity is granted, its not grabbeded will granted willy nilly. They went through a really thorough deliberation process on this and they felt that even though Maggie Haberman and others have done great reporting from the administration, that having someone on the inside that was able to bring some sort of texture to that reporting was the solution. Book that came out on wednesday, its the weeks most popular article, this oped has been viewed more than 13. Million times on nytimes. Com. That makes it the times most red single article of the year. So from a page view, from a traffic perspective. But carl bernstein, what about the ethics of this decision . Theres a lot of critics out there that say that the times should not have given this person anonymity. I think its an appropriate article to publish anonymously. I think theres something about the author not coming forward. This is different from the case of deep throat where we were seeking information from someone inside during nixon presidency, someone who did not want to volunteer much information and we were able to get some out of deep throat about an ongoing criminal conspiracy. Rather than this is someone on the inside, who has come to a newspaper and said, here, i am going to give you this, and i think its absolutely right that the New York Times published it, but i would hope that this individual would come forward in the National Interest and give himself more credibility in what he has to say by identifying himself or herself and letting us know and then becoming part of the open debate about Donald Trumps presidency as reported in Bob Woodwards book. Because the two follow parallel tracks in which those closest to the president are saying he cannot be trusted with the National Security of the United States. We have never had this in our history. The final days of nixon, yes, something a little different with an unstable president because of the pressures he was under, but for from the first days of a presidency, a president of the United States who those working with him consider him a danger to the National Security of the United States, this is really extraordinary. Look at what axios said earlier in the week, when this oped came out, two other senior officials reached out to axios reached out and said the author came and stole the words right off the bat out of our mouths. There are some folks coming out saying it wasnt me, it wasnt me. Sarah sanders the White House Press secretary even told people to call up the opinion page and complain about what happened, we can put her message on screen there. The thing about the New York Times phone system, if you call up and say opinion, you i got two calls saying how outraged people were, and i got three calls from subscribers saying how proud they were of what we have done. Going back to something that carl was saying, they understand that for tough in depth reporting, for bob woodward or cnn or the New York Times is theyre going to trust the people we choose, were just not going to grant anonymity, were not just going to slap on sloppy vetting. There are a lot of folks out there who do not trust anything about the New York Times or cnn. Thats true, we rise and fall on the credibility of our reporting. But you look at the Pulitzer Prize that Maggie Haberman and others have won, that the Washington Post have won, some of the break through investigative work. Its not like the and saying i demand all these corrections, you know, when they had that meeting over the summer. Its not like when donald trump came to the Editorial Board when he was elected president , to say what a jewel the New York Times was. We know that donald trump has been anonymous source for stories over the decades, and he has praised woodward. Anonymity isnt just granted all over the place. Its really thoughtfully handled. All right, guys, stand by. Thank you both for being here. After the break, when is a fox news interview really just a pep rally. Were going to talk about that when we come back. cause thats no ordinary family. Thats your family. Which is why you didnt grab just any cheese. You picked up new kraft expertly paired cheddar and swiss for eggs. Beat that kraft. Family greatly. door bell rings its ohey. This is amazing. With moderate to severe ulcerative colitis, are you okay . Even when i was there, i never knew when my symptoms would keep us apart. So i talked to my doctor about humira. I learned humira can help get, and keep uc under control when other medications havent worked well enough. And it helps people achieve control that lasts. So you can experience few or no symptoms. Humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. Serious, so