Were his wife cindy and his family and at his death he served the United States of america faithfully for 60 years. And want to bring in kelly ayotte who was on the Armed Services committee traveled around the world many times with john mccain. Senator, youre thoughts about john mccain and how this lion of the senate and great leader of the Armed Services committee brought a new senator into the fold and what he taught you. Andrea, just what a tremendous loss for the country, and what he taught me, he was my dear friend. He was a mentor. He was such a tremendous leader on national security. As you know, everywhere in the world that he traveled he was so well received and he was tough on leaders that needed it. They needed tough love. John taught me really the things that i will remember the most, he actually taught me in the senate but he also recently repeated it to me when i saw him at his ranch in the spring. He said do the right thing. And that was how john lived his life. Really doing the right thing. Even if it was a difficult thing. And even when people would criticize him for it. Just the courage that he showed, the leadership and the leader that he was, extraordinary, oneofakind. You called him a lion. I wished there were more john mccains but he was oneofakind. Senator, it strikes me in covering the senate years ago and for a long time, it was a boys club. The men of the senate and john mccain has always mentored younger women when me came into the senate. Hillary clinton, people in different parties, Amy Klobuchar in Armed Services and other committees. Ill tell johnny ernst. And john traveled with her. And john very much, he judged you on your ability and as you know, he has very strong daughters and he to me really that was part of his core. And he could see when people were capable and he wanted to give them the opportunity and to give them the help and guidance so they could succeed. And you traveled with and were look at pictures in the senate of you in the Senate Briefing room with john mccain, with Lindsey Graham. That friendship may have been strained in recent months or years because of the effect of donald trump, but they really they and Joe Lieberman and the others were such close friends. Such close friends. I mean, first of all, Lindsey Graham and Joe Lieberman and john mccain, the original three amigos of the three of them, incredibly close and believe in the exceptional role of america and American Leadership and standing up for human rights around the world. And john was the leader of that. Whenever he traveled, any person that was was a threat he would stand up to them and he stood up for our values and his legacy will be one of i think it is clear vision of americas role in the world and standing up for people who were not in a position to be able to stand up for themselves. And as you talk to him when you last saw him, and he was battling this terrible disease, the courage with which he fought this final battle has been so extraordinary and so heroic. Tell me about his attitude and how he could maintain that spirit . Well, john had that same fortitude and was resolute until the end. And the other thing about john, incredibly optimistic, about life and youve heard him say, im the luckiest man alive. His family and the country and our future and that was true even when he was fighting cancer. I mean, it didnt change john mccain and the inner fortitude that he had and you think about that ford tud fortitude to geo the awful experience of being a prisoner of war and that courage it took and he showed that throughout his life. Kelly ayotte, thank you for calling in and we share the nations grief with you. But for you it is deeply personal and thank you very much for taking this time. Thank you. Andrea, i want to say, for cindy and johns family and incredible people and im just so sad for them. And for all of us tonight. A real loss for the nation. Well, we all feel that same sense that this is an extraordinary moment, extraordinary family and they have shown such strength but the pain must be truly unbearable tonight. Thank you very much. And with me now is andy card, former white house chief of staff under president george w. Bush. And andy, as you think back on that 2000 campaign and how tough that was, and then over the years how president bush and john mccain and you in the middle worked together on some very big policies. Well i didnt play much of a role. It was truly john mccain and george w. Bush recognizing that the greater good is worth the effort to put into making a way to find it find the greater good. And john mccain look he was a tough negotiator and he had sharp elbows and could be pretty angry at times. But he would find a way to find Common Ground. And he would work at it. He would invite people to stand on Common Ground with him. And george w. Bush also had sharp elbows but he worked with john mccain and they came together and did some remarkable things. And i was impressed with the leadership that they both had. I was respectful of how they respected each other. That was very important. John mccain was someone who grew up in a military family. He understood the role of respect and he did show Great Respect to people. But he also had the courage to be a maverick. And there arent a lot of people that do that. They kind of follow the false expectation that you have love everybody. He didnt love everybody. But he respected everybody. And he found a way to work together. I was glad to hear joe leibermans name mentioned the other day. Clearly he had a remarkable relationship with john mccain that i think they could have been a ticket to run for president and vice president. They were so close. And there was Great Respect for both of them. And joe leibiebermans relationp with john mccain was something to witness in the senate. I had the benefit of working with both of them on the legislation that came up after 9 11 and we really respected how john mccain and Joe Lieberman would find other senators to find Common Ground to stand on and get things done for the country. And you talked about joe lea lieberman and we knew from the books written and from john mccain himself that he wanted Joe Lieberman to be his running mate but he was persuaded by other Campaign Advisers and people in the party that the convention would never accept a democrat as the running mate for john mccain in 08. Well that convention where he was nominated, it was strange because all of the talk then was about what was happening in iraq and afghanistan and it wasnt what was happening in the economy and the crash came after the economic the economic crash came after the republican convention. I think the tickets on both parties might have been very different if the economic problems had been exposed before the conventions took place. But they didnt. That is a story in history. But this is a time to reflect on john mccains remarkable contributions to this country and the world. And he really has been a champion for democracy all around the world. Through his work at the International Republican institute under the partnership of the National Endowment for democracy which im part of it and i respect the work that they do. But john mccain was a champion for democracy in america. But more significantly, he was a champion for democracy around the world and he actually did the work. He traveled with his colleagues from the Republican Party to do it with the International Republican institute and with his democratic friends in the National Democratic institute, all working to plant seeds of democracy in places all around the world so people could experience the remarkable way we have a government that invites people to be part of it and it is a it is a we the people government of the United States and john mccain made sure that every person in america recognized that they had a chance to be part of that we that makes this country great. Thank you so much, andy card. Thank you for your recollections about this great man, john mccain. And a statement from president George Herbert walker bush, bush 41 writing john mccain was a Public Service and few contributed to the welfare of his fellow citizen and free and loving people around the world. Another american maverick and warrior george paton once observed we should thank god that men such as these have lived, to that i could only add my gratitude to johns wife cindy and his family and the people of arizona that allowed this man to serve with such distinction and this statement from former president barack obama, john mccain and i were membered of different generations, came from completely different backgrounds and complete competed at the highest level of politics but we shared for all of our differences for fidelity to something higher, the ideals for which generations of americans have fought and marched and sacrifice. We saw our political battles as a privilege and something noble to serve as the high ideals at home and to advance them around the world. We saw this country as a place where anything is possible and citizenship is our patriotic obligation to ensure it for ever remains that way. Few of vus been tested the way john once was or required to show the courage that he did but all of us could aspire to put the greater good above our own. At johns best he showed us what that means and for that were all in his debt. Michelle and i sent our heart felt condolences to cindy and their family. And with us now is bill crystal, a veteran of Bush Administration and from the weekly standard. Bill, youve witnessed the political wars in washington and this is a man that participated and also conquered and really represents the best of the political gladiators in washington. Think that is right. I voted for him in in the republican primies in 2000 and 2008 and then the general election in 2008 and got to know him well and he was a fierce competitor and had a temper. But occasionally i would be sort of going on about someone we were fighting an some Foreign Policy issue or warg a and ar he would say, look he has a point of view and lets calm down and were all in the same side here. Were all trying to do the best for the country and he had that ability to kind of get above the partisanship and hostility at the same time he engaged in it. Bill, he also worked with democrats. That is something we dont see often any more. Republicans and democrats legislating together. And Joe Lieberman was his closest friend and i heard about the ticket, i went back and looked, the piece in the New York Times in 2008, the weekend before he made the vp choice urging or maybe ten days before urging lieberman as the pick and i was told indirectly that john mccain was thinking seriously and wouldnt mind having someone on the outside try to validate it a little bit, especially among republicans and conservatives. I tried to people told them they couldnt get it through the convention. I dont think that is correct. It could have. It would have been a fight. But mccain went to palin and i thought might as well take a gamble if it is not lieberman that that is way in retrospect, im more john mccain wrote last week, john wrote that last month, last year he wrote in the book that he regretted that he hadnt gone ahead and picked Joe Lieberman. I dont know that they would have won but it would have been an interesting and fighting moment in american politics to that that ticket and barack obama might have won the election any way but that didnt happen. But he accomplished a lot. He worked with democrats and not just moderates like joe, but Teddy Kennedy and Russ Feingold and a ton of different pieces of legislation. And i would say one more thing. I was talking to someone tonight who worked for mccain, and a young man that i recommended him to, mark salterman and he worked for john mccain for several years and he moved on to other things in washington and it was very sweet and he thanked me for the opportunity of having the honor of working for john mccain which wasnt just i just recommended him. He did the job. But he was reminding me of the Little Things mccain did, which were genuinely gracious and thoughtful and considerate. He was he could berate staff if something went wrong as people did occasionally and in his case pretty occasionally but not that often. He would do all kinds of Little Things for people and relatives people that wanted to meet him. And go out of his way to do things, jake tapper had this pointed out he had a little party for a young man getting the medal of honor by president obama several years ago and jak jakin vieted many and he no need to do it or anything like that. It wasnt someone he knew or just thought, you know what, someone has served his country and i had the chance to show up for half an hour and pay my respect and ill do it and there were Little Things like that with mccain that were really unusual as kind of personal decency and concern for others. Bill crystal, that is so true. The Little Things, the little kindnesses for someone who could be testy and difficult and even describe himself, he was also very, very kind. Thank you, bill. Thanks for joining us. Thank you. And with us for more comment on john mccain and the legacy, author and president ial historian michael beshlas. Bill crystal was talking about the possibility of this bipartisan ticket with Joe Lieberman which who was his first choice to be his running mate. Help me here. In american history, have we ever had a democratic and republican or two different parties on the ticket . Not in modern times. Franklin roosevelt for instance in 1940 chose helpry walla he colins who was a republican but in modern times the conflict has become so fierce as were saying just a few moments earlier, it is almost unthinkable. And another thing that you were talking with bill crystal about was john mccains character. One element was this ability to go across the aisle and some of his greatest friendships in the senate were with people that were democrats. But the other thing is that in the 19th century and the 18th century oftentimes American Parents who were bringing up children looking for role models would look to political leaders as examples of people they wanted their children to grow up to be like. Im afraid in 2018 that doesnt happen very often. And there are some people who do some very good work in the senate. But my guess is that not terribly many families these days across the United States say, i want my child to grow up to be like senator x. John mccain is an exception to that. For all sorts of reasons, and i think youve touched on and the people weve spoken to have been talking about but the paramount example is the 5 1 2 years he spent in hanoi in the hanoi hilton during which he was tortured and given the opportunity to leave captivity earlier and he wouldnt do it and it came out. So it was not only the courage, but most of all is this. Anyone who had been through that experience for five and a half years, you would expect afterwards to be justifiably angry, they wouldnt be able to operate in life in a way that all of us would like to see. The thing about john mccain was despite that experience this was someone who was gracious, in was someone civil who did have a sense of proportion about life and maybe the best example of that, i think, was as you know andrea and you reported and weve talked about this too, in the 1990s when there was a movement to restore relations with vietnam, another kind of person who had gone through 5 1 2 years in the hanoi hilton would have said absolutely not. Im a holdout. Last country on earth we should restore relations with is vietnam. But john mccain was someone of the first. He said this is the time to restore that relationship and to do it with healing. It says so much about him. And exactly. End did it for a democratic president who wanted that policy but didnt have the political weight with the military to do it himself. Absolutely. Not served in vietnam because bill clinton had been scory ated during t during the 92 campaign and so having not served and on the two sides of the war and antiwar debate helped bill clinton effect that policy. Thank you, again, michael. Our friend tom brokaw sat down with the senator for one of his last interviews and he recalled what michael was just referring to. When he was shot down and held captive in vietnam. Senator, when you woke up this morning, did you say to yourself, where was i 50 years ago in. I did. And i thought, wow, maybe i zigged when i should have zagged. And i thought about it. But i also thought about, tom, about the heros that i have known and the benefit of having served in the company of heroes and the im the luckiest guy you will ever talk to. Want to hanoi and i stood at the edge of the lake and i got emotional thinking about you and going down a second time and them grabbing you and doing all of that. Does that memory ever fade for you . Is it there constantly or can you park it somewhere . It doesnt fade. But i have parked it. Tom, in life we have to go on. And put it behind us and be grateful and every once in a while something reminds me of it or i hear from an old friend who calls up and asked me why i voted wrong and they never call me and tell me i voted right. So think about it. But what i really think about is the people that i had the honor of serving with. Some of the gutsiest, most patriotic, most wonderful people ive ever known in my life. Theyre