Transcripts For KQED Charlie Rose 20170503

Charlie welcome to the program. We begin this evening with the author and historian David Mccullough. I like to write about people who i feel deserve more attention and credit. I like to bring them front and center stage. I like to write about the wives of these people. I like to write about people you never heard of because why should they remain in the shadows or in the wings, as it were. And the other im drawn to people who set off set out to accomplish something worthy, noble even that they knew would be difficult which turned out to be even more difficult than anyone imagined and they succeeded. Charlie we conclude with three syrian women who have activists. We want to highlight the syrian story through the syrian eyes not from the outside. Seeing more syrians speak about syria. Listening to syrians. We heard about the u. S. Strike but we havent heard any syrians speaking about how the strike affected the lives. Charlie the case for history and three activists in syria. Join us. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Charlie David Mccullough is here and won two Pulitzer Prizes and the president ial medal of freedom. His collection of books is over speeches delivered in the past decades. Its called the american spirit who we are and what we stand for. Welcome. Thank you, charlie. Im glad to be back. Charlie its very good to see you. Before we talk about this book youve been outspoken about president trump. I have. Along with great many other historians and that was last summer. Charlie you and ken fortz formed a group. We were all saying the same thing. It was concern for the country and concern about values and behavior and belief in the truth. Belief in tolerance. Belief in kness and empathy and charlie these are all things you think should be president ial qualities. Yes, i do. I think a certain confidence is essential and you dont base your campaign on your attacks on your opponents using fear and smear and unkind actions and words. I think what disturbed all of us who made that effort the historians and biographers is understanding of history is essential in leadership. Leadership of all kinds. And our most conscientious president s not always the most talented or eloquent have been students of history. Charlie including those who had not been University President s. Harry truman being one you know well. He never went to college but never stopped reading history. He said wonderful things. He said the only new thing in the world is the history you dont know. Now with our 45th president , we have a leader who doesnt know much of anything in the way of history and who has said so. Charlie he said i dont read biographies. Dismisses books. Dismisses history. My feeling about the importance of history, as you said, going back several decades and thats what this book is a collection of. I think we must encourage, stimulate and bring history back to its importance in the whole system of education. Charlie a couple things. When eisenhower said theres 14 qualities you measure a leader by quality, responsibility, character, experience. And Dwight Eisenhower wrote one of the of the best books about the world war. Charlie better than what Winston Churchill wrote . Its from a Military Point in view. No, you cant compare anybody to churchill. Hes superb. I only know this because i know his editor and he said he wrote every word of that book and kennedy was a great student of history. Charlie his father encouraged it. Yes. On the mantle piece in the state dining house in the white house there was an a carving from Franklin Roosevelt from a letter from john adams to his wife abigail and he was the first president to spend the night there and he felt it was so important to be there forever. When the white house had to be rebuilt during trumans presidency, truman made sure it went back in the mantle piece. Then when kennedy was president he had it carved into the marble part rather than the wood which had been prior to that. What adams wrote to abigail was may none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof. What i love about it is he puts honest first. Strength of character is what matters in that job. Strength of and confidence that the american spirit is enduring and which is the title of the book. Yes. And i have spent a lot of time with john adams and harry truman and Theodore Roosevelt and a feel many historians expressed the same thought. You get to know these People Better than you know people in real life charlie through their letters . Exactly. And the letters are so revealing and theyre so often touching. Theyre eloquent and the relationship between bess around marr harry truman and abigail and john adams found in the letters and theres over 1,000 letters between Abigail Adams and john adams. Neither of them was capable of writing a boring letter or a short one. Youre reminded that history is human. His historys not about remembering dates and quotations, its about human beings. Thats why its so important. Jefferson said any nation that expects to be ignorant and free expects what it never was and never can be. And he said when in the course of human events and the operative word is human, none of these people who occupied our highest office have ever been perfect. Charlie remind me jefferson didnt write books. No. Charlie did he write letters . Yes, indeed. Charlie many letters as many as adams. Jefferson destroyed every letter he ever wrote to his wife or she wrote to him. He would write to friends of theirs saying if you have correspondence from my wife return it to me and he destroyed it. Charlie why do you think he did that . I think he felt his private life must remain private. Charlie why didnt you write about jefferson or washington . I like to write about people who i feel deserve more attention and credit. I like to bring them front and center stablge. I like to write about the wives of these people and people you never heard of because why should they remain in the shadows or wings, as it were. Im inspired by people who set off to accomplish something worthy, noble even that they knew would be difficult and which turned out to be more difficult than anyone imagined and they succeeded. But i have written before washington, charlie. My book 1776 is about washington. Charlie but not a biography. Was washington the greatest man of the Founding Fathers . Yes. Charlie no question . Yes. No question. Charlie in every way . If youre tabulating i. Q. Or ability charlie the qualities of the revolution, character, integrity, responsibility, experience all there. He was the leader of our country for 16 years not eight years because he was a commander in chief through the war when we had no president. Then he became president. He was at the helm and in charge for 16 years and citing examples of behavior of courage, of perseverance. Spirit and perseverance is what he says in the quote that i use for the start of this one. Charlie i know youve been asked this one million times, what about Alexander Hamilton . Well, hes a subject i ran into in writing about adams and writing about jefferson to a degree and washington. I know hes very much in vogue right now and a have not seen the show. Charlie why not . I guess because ive been too busy. Charlie no. Yes, i have. And ill probably see it some day. Im not against it. Anything that will get them under the tent im all four. I think ron chernos book is wonde wondfu wondful erful and and were living in a time where theyre writing wonderful books. So many in my times have there been good writers to produce fabulous books. Charlie so whats your judgment on hamilton . Great man . One of the most brilliant men brilliant, great numerous human flaws. Charlie mainly women or other than that . I dont think he had to go the way he went. Charlie meaning he should not have done the duel. He didnt have to do that. I didnt like the way he treated adams. Charlie thats what it is. That i do know something about. Hamiltons in vogue right now and fine. Fine. We can never know enough about that founding era. Not just because its the revolutionary war but its the American Revolution which is still going on. Benjamin rush said it will keep going on forever. Were still working on it. Thats our advantage. Were constantly trying to make life better. Our system better. Weve had good people who are willing to give every effort. Imagine john kennedy saying we will go to the moon and we did. Kennedy almost never talked about himself. Its really interesting. Theres a lot to be learned from each of these people. I feel strongly as a stress in the book its not just the presidency that matters, its congress. Weve had very great people in congress. Congress has accomplished many worthy achievements we should never take for granted. Charlie you actually make that point well is that we sort of tend to have congress in contempt because even president obama said to me i said to him you think americas the Strongest Military or the best technology or Financial System or the best rule of law, you know. So what could go wrong and he said to me, our politics. One of the clearest lessons of history is little of consequence is accomplished alone. Its a joint effort. As soon as congress recovers from not working together on common objectives and you have to work across the aisle. You have to accept the other individual can have a very different opinion without you attacking him or her in unfair and unkind ways. You cant do that. Youre going to need that somebody on some other project or Mission Later on. I think what ted kennedys together was a serious blow to that kind of across the aisle camaraderie and working in the congress. You worked with the Bush Administration on administration. Hes constantly working with people in the other party. Charlie trent lott said if they only knew. Meaning if they only knew how hard you worked for. Do you think we somehow lost a sense of purpose . Absolutely not. We have been through worse times by far. We interested serious obstacles in our path over and over but we come through. Charlie things like mccarthy civil war, influenza, the American Revolution. Most people dont understand at the time of therican revolution one third of the country was for it, one third was absolutely against it and the remaining third were waiting to see how it came out. It wasnt as though the whole country wanted this to happen. And these problems created suffering and denial of fairness and equality and life and death in a way were not used to and in many ways were spoiled by all weve been given by our predecessors not just in material wealth but in the way of opportunity. Think of our education system. Yes, its gotten much too expensive. Yes, it has its flaws and systems. But we have created the greatest universities in the world. Charlie 18 of the top 20 universities around the world are american. Why do people from abroad want to come here because we know what it is. We take it for granted. We work medical miracles of the kind nobody would ever believe possible. Charlie smart people think curing cancers within sight. Theres very big things coming. Charlie but you write about politics. You wrote about the brooklyn bridge. I whole a whole book about the americans who went to paris. I think history can be the art. It can be poetry, it can be the music it will last the longest by far and we have to include that because thats part of being human. Charlie whats the responsibility of government when it comes to culture and science and supporting those very important sectors . Very important Government Support is there. Pbs and the humanities and the art, science, absolutely. If anything there should be more. Im all for it. Ive worked hard to keep the institutions going. Believe in them fervently. Charlie something about you, you think theres a great week for wrote about gerald ford. I do. Charlie we dont really know, do we . Truman said we have to wait 50 years for the dust to settle. Thats very wise. These president s look very different after a while. Historians outing to wait. Of course, this is my own personal feeling and its some marvelous books have been written about leading political figures within the 50year lineup. If youre working in this field theres always something new to discover. I never embark on a subject someone no one knew about. Charlie you always find something. Sometimes its new and exciting. Thats why i think how we teach history ought to be more in the spirit of the lab technique. You dont just tell the student all about what happened and who dit and why and what it cost. You give them a project to work on and theyre doing the digging and figuring out the story. Ive done that when i taught at universities and it works. Give you a photograph, graduating class tuskegee 1912 and its up to you to write a paper on the subject. I tell you, Young Charlie rose, youll be the leading expert on the graduating class of the tuskegee class in 1912. They did it and they wrote about the sinking of a sub in 1942. Terrific subject. They get into it and care about it. I had a fellow i gave a picture of sergeant york. A famous hero of world war i. He was very befuddled about it because he never heard of this man. I said how much do you know about world war i and he said i know nothing. I know there had to have been a world war i. He got to work and wrote a superb paper on sergeant york. Ten years ago i ran into him and he said i was in your class at cornell and i said who did you get and he said i want you to know world war i has been my hobby ever since. It takes. It works. Charlie one thing can stimulate a life long university. You said nothing ever happened the way it happened. Never had to hap the way it happened. So often it seemed to be on track and theres no such thing as a selfmade man or woman. Never was or will be. Charlie because theres always circumstances and timing and influence and your rival or enemy can be the spur that makes you do what you do. Charlie im over the place but its curious to me, john adams, did he have a lot of people who didnt like him and was it because of his personality . I suppose so but he was very well liked. Some people found him irritable because he spoke the truth but he was admirable so many ways who said washington should be in command said jefferson should write the declaration of independence. The only founding father who became president who never owned a slave as a matter of principle and the next president to never own a slave was his son because abigail was adamant on the subject. We can never fully understand the influence of the women that have been part of the story from the beginning. Theres a whole field that needs more explanation. Charlie you have said too the best president s were historians. Yes. Woodrow wilson was a president. He is one of the top president s no question. Was he perfect, by no means. Was he in the top ten, wilson . I never ranked president s but id say he was, yes. Washington was a great reader of history and adams and jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt beban a quite good naval history while still a student at harvard and Franklin Roosevelt was a reader of history. Eisenhower was a great reader of history. Truman, kennedy. Barack obama. Charlie i saw barack obama and i saw him because were doing something for a future project and i said hows the memoir coming and he said ive already written two chapters. I said thats amazing. He said i started writing in tahiti. Its not a history but a memoir. It will be an important book. Charlie because of unique insight and the capacity he has for words. Absolutely. Very talented writer. And a gentlemen. Charlie interesting. Bush 41, john meacham was going to call the book the left gentlemen and his publisher wanted something else. I have known seven president s i interviewed them or spent time with them. Nothing like you have but the one i know best is bush senior. Charlie 41. And i knew him, met him well before he got in politics and hes a wonderful human being. Charlie thats what comes out doesnt it . The sense of integrity, you ma t mant humanity and patriot six a man at 18 years old gets accept to yale and goes to the navy and is the youngest pilot in the navy and shot down and forever lived with the fact that two of his people on the plane with him never were found. Right. Hes remarkable. Charlie in fact president obama called him the most underrated president of recent time. Well, i dont know about that. Charlie whos more underrated. I dont like to pass judgment on him that recently. Charlie because of the next 50 years . I think those that served the country before they became president and went through the hard time adds did kennedy daz harry truman and others in world war i and saw some of the toughest battlefield experience of the war, harry truman can. They were hardened in a way and also learned about leadership. Charlie tell me about the speeches in here. You have adams in here. A letter to friends the american spirit. Listen to this. This is so gret to see you. Also by David Mccullough the Wright Brothers truman, the pat between the c. This is dedicated to your grand children about 15 of them. 19. What speech in here best reflects your sense of the american spirit . Is there one or two . The speech i was invited to make a speech before the joint session of congress. That was a very high honor because civilians arent often asked to do that. Id say that one is high up there. The speech i gave at Athens Ohio University is one i put a lot of thought in fact ill read you just one passage from that that i felt very much summed up my feelings. This was a commencement speech. Whenever ive been asked to deliver a commencement speech i fello fellow felt obliged, honorbound to work hard to prepare it. I like to leave them with some convictions of mine that i really feel strongly about. I said when bad news is riding high and despair impassion and loud mouths and corruption seem to own center stage, when some keep crying the countrys going to the dogs, remember its always been going to the dogs in the eyes of some and 90 or more of the people are good people, generous hearted, lawabiding, good citizens who get to work on time, do a good job, love their country, pay their taxes, care about their neighbors and care about their childrens education and believe rightly as you do in the ideals life is founded. I said see the world. Take up painting or the piano. Discover how much you never knew about insects. Go climb a mountain and whenever you check out out of a hotel or motel be sure you tip the maid. Charlie well said. I went to a Service Today for David Rockefeller who was an expert on collecting beetles. You mentioned insects. Theres a wonderful book about the life and world of insects that blew me out of my chair i liked it so much. Charlie you consider yourself a man of massachusetts . No, im a man of pennsylvania, massachusetts, connecticut. Charlie you live in we live in massachusetts. I grew up in pittsburgh, pennsylvania which had a great influence on me. Charlie how so . For one thing its a city full of history and there was a lot of history talked about and in the Second World War in grade school we were very much involved in spirit and attitude and the reality of the war. We in pittsburgh were helping to win the war. We were the arsenal of democracy and so on. The conversations were about so much that happened in pittsburgh. The fires and floods and strikes and things like that. The history of our own family. I think what your parent and grandparents talk about has great influence on ones interest in history. I think one of this best things parents can do for their children or grandchildren to encourage an interest in history is take them to Historic Sites. Take them to washington. Take them to williamsburg. Take them to a Historic Site within your neck of the woods. Take them to famous battlefields and the new American Revolution museum thats just opened in philadelphia. Phenomenal. Absolutely phenomenal and theres never been a great museum about the American Revolution until now. Charlie two things before we close. Where do you put the president ial medal of freedom that came to David Mccullough. You mean what cabinet . I consider it the highest honor. What matters most to me is none of my books havent been out of print in 50 years. Charlie people still read every one of them. Yes. Charlie its great to have you. Thank you, charlie. I consider it a privilege to be your guest. Your tops. Charlie thank you. The book is called the american spirit who we are and what we stand for. And it is a collection of speeches and to know David Mccullough is to know when he writes a speech he thinks about it because he has something he wants to say. Back in a moment. Stay with us. Charlie Syrian Civil War is considered the biggest humanitarian crisis in the 21st century. Imagines have permeated western media but how are journalists collecting the news and video feed and what are the risks to journalists and how do womens voices play in the narrative. Joining me are three syrian women, noha alkamcha, Yasmin Kayali sabra is with a humanitarian organization and zaina erhaim is a coordinator for the institute for war and peace reporting and listed as an unsung hero of 2016 by thomsonreuters. Tell me exactly about aleppo. I wasnt there for the siege so i havent seen the worse. Charlie where were you for the siege . In turkey then. I was one of the lucky ones who was outside the city under the siege. Even about the siege the daily life was a suffer. Some daily issues that arent newsworthy for a journalist. It would occupy your life like someone was killed by a shrapnel with in the street and for you it may be someone you have been around for the last year and keeping distance with the source was striking for me. It seemed the values and impartia impartialit impartiality kept you afraid from being on the news that you were killed in an air strike and it may not make it to International Media but it will be on the syrian ones. Charlie how did you handle that . The syrians found a way to adapt whats going on. You accept moment by moment and accept to be killed any moment because this is the life. On the other hand you start to live more because you feel this might be your last moment so you let it go. You do things you wouldnt do if youre strategically planning for the future. You have more friends, more powerful relationships and try to do your best. You report all you can and write all the things you can because you may not be able to do it tomorrow so as the pros and cons to be frank. Charlie how did you become an activist . I was born in damascus and moved to the states when i was 15 years old. Initially i worked for civil rights organizations in chicago and minnesota. In 2013 and postconflict i relocated to turkey and cofounded the Civil Society Organization Called the syrian forum. Basically its a consortium of institutions that try to show the syrian conflicts from media to strategic studies and train and development and humanitarian and job placement for refugees in turkey. I became an activist because i was concerned about the Human Rights Violations that were happening in syria. We have a regime of 50 years old that was deeply rooted and basically arbitrarily killing civilians and detaining people who rose up and calling for freedom and democracy. The basic rights of any developed country. Since then ive been very involved. Charlie your here for what reason . We want to talk to the public and change the perception thats been going on in the Mainstream Media that the syrian conflict is isis. We want to tell the public we exist. Syrian Civil Society has emerged postconflict and theyre considered to be the boots on the ground delivering humanitarian aid and doing peace building and women are on the front lines of fighting terrorism. Theyre combatting child recruits and we want to highlight the conflict because its the bottomup approach. In the future when the assad regime falls down well be responsible for the peace process. Charlie when do you think the assad regime will fall down . Once the International Community takes a serious role in Holding Assad accountable for the atrocities. Charlie what is his role . That brings us to the u. S. Strikes that were recently launched against the assad regime. Theres a lot of concerns the u. S. Strikes were a pr propaganda for the government however, this is first time the regime is held accountable in front of the International Community ever since the chemical attack that happened in august of 2013 and the Previous Administration drew the line saying if you commit more atrocities or use chemical weapons well take action and no action was taken and it was a gren light to the assad regime and russia and it the attack deterred them. This is what we were cheering for. We werent cheer forking cheering for the intervention specifically but supportive of the action because we want to deter assad and russia from committing the crimes. Charlie i have one point to add. It was sad but i would hold assad accountable specifically for pushing syrians to the stage where were actively cheering for another foreign country bombing our land. In 2011 when this was a survey do you support the International Intervention in syria more than 80 said no, completely, were against any International Intervention in 2011 when the uprising started and now those that voted no changed that because assad pushed us to this level. And i want to add this is not the first strike. The strikes have been going on. More than 4,000 strikes have hit syrian lands and many killed civilians. Charlie so they killed isis fighters but also civilians. Last month they killed 70 people in raqqah and aleppo and its killed the source that was going out from that air base to kill other syrians. Charlie what does your organization do . Its an organization mostly concerned with development, education and relief. And so our model is based on community centers. We set up community understands in the under privileged communities in the neighbors communities. Were responsive to their communities and their needs, we have schools, small grants, Women Empowerment programs, etcetera. Charlie and you train people every day. Yes. Charlie you live in jordan . Yes. Charlie you go back and forth. Yes. Charlie what do you want the United States to do . How can the United States do more to help the Syrian People . Its a difficult question but i think theyve already been involve in the military face of the problem or the conflict. Sadly they were only focussing on isis. Its still in power. Charlie explain to america why thats true. Assad only exists because of the regime. In 2012 when the uprising started assad released most of the leaders who are now leading isis and other extremist groups from their prison. Charlie and he wanted to accomplish what . Build up an organization that would look like he built that. When the demonstrations were peaceful he started spreading the propaganda were fighting terrorists. At the time we were laughing at the propaganda. All in the streets were Women University students or regular syrians demanding their basic rights charlie this was a protest in the wave of protests that came after the arab spring began. Exactly. The way the regime started that propaganda and we were laughing out turned out to be true because he was planning towards this. The release of the extremists from the assad prisons and suddenly they held arms. We dont buy it for the streets like the u. S. So getting arms happened for a reason. Charlie some would argue the out should focus on assad more than isis as you have said assad is a recruiting tool for isis. Is that correct . That is correct. Charlie would you like to see the United States focus more on assad or both at the same time . A recently published Research Shows 96 of the syrians who have been killed since the beginning of the uprising were killed by assad forces unlike what the International Media is reporting. I think assad is killing more than any other foreigner. We are the ones who think, ok, we are fighting isis because theyre terrorizing. Theyre terrorizing us more than anyone else. Despite that, assad has killed 96 of the syrians. For me, for most the syrians inside assad is still the problem. Charlie should he be the primary focus . Our secretary of state said not long ago our principle strategy now is to attack isis until weve run them out of raqqah. And thats the wrong strategy as far as youre concerns . Theyre still dealing with the illness. Maybe we will not have isis, well have a Different Group that is still functioning the same which is terrorizing not only syrians charlie if in fact the United States supported all the Syrian Forces and the syrians who oppose assad is that enough with the support of the United States and other arab countries to overthrow assad or not . As he stabilized with Russian Support his own place so it will be unlike 2011 very difficult to overthrow him, quote, change the regime. If the only way for someone to have power over a city is forcibly displace all the inhabitants to another area in syria how is that person in power . If the only way for this person to be in power is to bomb his own people and destroy the infrastructure of his own country how can you call this person in power . I dont care how many bombs come down from the sky, you have to have a legitimacy with your own people. Its gone. Charlie he has no legitimacy with his own people . No. The amount of bloodshed if i have to put in detention more than 200,000 of my own people to keep them quiet or drive out millions of people out of my country, most of the activists inside the country are now outside and go in neighboring countries, why . Why do we have to do that . Charlie because you cannot survive inside . No, i cannot. I cant go back to syria. I cant go to the border. If i do i will probably be detained and no one will see me again and those that work with me though im not a politically outspoken person, im not a political activist. I work in humanitarian aid. This is all i have done. This is the biggest mistake i have done in the last six years and yet i have to pay the price. This is my land like it is their land. It is my right to live in my land and go back to my city. I cannot go back. My house was not destroyed but i cannot go back to my house. Taking away this basic write for me is the greatest atrocity. Charlie how do you feel about the west reaction to whats happening in syria . Do you feel like youve been ignored . Do you fee do you feel weve been doing this work the past six years so far. I toured in the u. S. In 2015 and i spoke to all these entities involved in somewhat supporting inside syria and a found myself saying the exact same things i said a couple years ago during this time of travel. I dont want to say the west have turned their backs on syrians. Theyre trying to support syrians in a way but sanctions are not enough to pressure assad. Charlie whats necessary . The sanctions that are currently employed are not affecting the regime and its compatriots. Charlie what do you want to see the United States, the arab states, western countries and other countries around the world. What i want to see in the International Media is highlighting the syrian story through the syrian eyes not from the outside. Seeing more syrians speaking about syria, listening to syrians. We all heard about the u. S. Airstrike but we havent heard any syrian speaking how the strike affected his life and how he felt about it. Is he hopeful after it . We have heard few voices. Charlie though i ask the question here this evening, as you know. What would they say. What would syrians say who have been afshth affected by the strike . Some i spoke with where the chemical strike happened were happy and hope assad will think twice before using chemical weapons but thats just one weapon of many being used. Bombs usually kill more than 70 in a crowded area like id lib now where everyone is being deported. Id like to hear more and someone counter the russian propaganda. Theyre saying theyre there fighting isis though the fact is and i was there in aleppo when the russian strikes started, russia helped isis advance because they were hitting the moderate rebels fighting isis on the ground. They were striking one from the sky from isis charlie were they hitting them because they were opposed to the assad regime . Isis supposedly opposed the assad regime. Russia was hitting the moderate rebels because they want to feed the assad propaganda that he is only fighting terrorists. We have seen the story where they did the capturing and russia captured it back. Because the rebels fighting isis on the ground and the rebels have paid the highest price ever more than any other International Force supposedly fighting isis and they were the main targets for the russian airstrikes besides the hospitals and schools and markets. This is not been highlighted enough in the International Media. That in a way is giving russia the legitimacy of isis. To build on what zaina has said we want to empower the organizations doing the work on the ground and considered to be the future of syria. Charlie you mean Financial Support or empower them by moral support . Empower them by before to even talk about negotiations and peace talks wed demand the release of Political Prisoners detained early on from 2011 by calling out for freedoms and democracy in the country. We want protection of civilians. We want safe zones for civilians before we even talk about peace talks and of course you would want assad to be forced to come back to the negotiation table for a ceasefire to take place. And hold the war criminals accountable for the work theyve done. This is the example we want to leave the new generation with. Not like those were criminals living freely in the u. S. And European Countries without being asked why youre here. While the syrians that are journalists and activities are being harassed because they hold syrian passports. Charlie you are brave to do what you do but id be remiss to say theres a lot of brave journalists from america and many have told the story of syria and whats happening in syria. I know you have met clarissa. We met in the house of my friend when she was reporting early in 2012. And what is sad is that if i ask you to name two people, two syrian journalists who have been kidnapped by isis you wouldnt be able to do so while if i ask you to name american journalists you can do that. The syrian victims are under reported because theyre syrian. I think this is there is very sad because theyre the main source for information and despite that because theyre syrians theyre being neglected. I know my friend has been kidnapped by isis the last four years. Im sure if he freed hed be considered a terrorist though he suffered and fought isis more than any other u. S. Citizen. Charlie thank you for coming. A pleasure to have you here. Thank you for joining us. See you next time. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications captioned by Media Access Group at wgbh access. Wgbh. Org rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Youre watching pbs