we look forward to seeing it later tonight, guys. thanks very, very much. just ahead, as u.s. forces step up the fight against isis, are u.s. members of congress afraid to support another war? nfl, new action and reaction to the widening scandal involving pro football and domestic violence. ♪ [ female announcer ] we love our smartphones.

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looking at live pictures of president obama touching down in florida. he's planning to meet with the u.s. military central command, commanders to talk about isis. that meeting tomorrow. terrorist group fighters are bragging they shot down a syrian fighter jet attacking them earlier today, now showing off pieces of the plane. this is the top u.s. military general reveals to congress that ground troops may eventually be needed to fight isis, despite president obama's promise of no combat boots on the ground. let's talk a little bit more about all of these issues, isis threat, the u.s. response. joining us, "crossfire" host, s.e. cupp, former white house press secretary, jay carney and gloria borgeer. are you surprised that there seems to be a little muddling?

>> wouldn't have happened if i were there. you're the chairman of the joint chiefs and a military man and asked a question about -- >> he wasn't asked a question. >> fair point. >> it was in his opening statement. >> of course, it stands to reason you can imagine a contingency that might develop that would lead you to make that recommendation to the commander in chief. the president is the commander in chief. the president has made clear that it is his policy that he won't send troops into combat on the ground again in iraq. i think in this case, i'm going with the commander in chief. you know, war is a complicated piece of business. things could change. but i don't expect president obama to -- >> hold on one second. i want to get your thoughts on this i did hear for the first time from general dempsey, chairman of the joint chiefs, that the u.s. mission was to destroy isis in iraq but to degrade isis in syria. the president, as you remember, repeatedly said the u.s. mission is to degrade and ultimately

destroy isis. he wasn't differentiating between syria and iraq? >> i don't think you can differentiate. the easier mission because -- as the president made clear when he spoke, i thought surprisingly forthcoming about the fact that we can expect some strikes in syria, which is something that he had resisted for a long time. oufr efforts and coalition efforts will occur in both theaters, our efforts are in iraq. >> i think this is about parsing words to a degree, wolf, on this question of combat. how do you define combat? if you're a military adviser and you're on the ground it's a dangerous situation. it's not as if, okay, i'm not on the front line there and, therefore, my life isn't in danger. your life is in danger. and i think we're going to be struggling with this. they're going to be struggling with it in congress if they ever get around to voting and, you know, this is an issue that the

white house is trying to kind of walk this fine line with the boots on the ground. well, what are boots on the ground? >> advisers are on the ground. >> how silly we must look to our allies and to our enemies, quibbling over what boots on the ground means. is general dempsey right, is president obama right, is joe biden right, is john kerry right? all because the president seems far more committed to a political talking point than he does to a clear military strategy. i can't believe that this is scaring anyone overseas, that we're having this debate so publicly. the president has the authority to say i don't know how serious or deep this mission will go, but the mission is to destroy isis and leave the rest of everything on the table. instead, he has boxed himself in. >> you think so? >> no, i don't. i understand this. there is a desire by some to commit the united states to an

open-ended war, open the possibility of another land invasion in iraq. there's no appetite in the united states for that. more than that, more than the unpopularity of that, we've been through that. we saw what it wrought. in many ways we are here today because of the decisions made to invade iraq more than a decade ago. >> the president is fond of choices. no one is talking about an open-end of war into perpetuity. we're talking about putting things on the table not take being things off the table so the president isn't in this very silly, semantic argument, having to defend a position that others around him, in his own circle are now contradicting. >> i think this is a question, basically, of credibility. what you tell the american people about the mission. how you define it. originally, humanitarian mission. protecting our personnel in baghdad. then there seemed to be kind of

a mission creep now to destroy isis. what does that mean? members of congress don't -- this isn't just the president. this is also members of congress who want to know exactly what they're authorizing again if they ever get around to voting. >> i guess it's a little bit unique right now. he may have more support. >> politics now, if the circle -- extremes come together at a point where i think there are -- there is a way in the republican party that is reluctant to do this. >> the isolation. >> smaller than the liberal wing of the democratic party that's reluctant to involve itself in another war. a president does need to put some parameters on what his policy is and not just say to america, you know what? we're now going to war again.

i can't really tell you what that will mean in terms of our commitment. you can say, as he did, that we want to dismantle and disrupt -- >> what's wrong with the president being totally transparent with the american people, with congress, saying here is what we're going to do. here is what we're not going to do. >> it's neither honest or realistic. as gloria pointed out we do have bo boots on the ground. if the president is committed to destroying isis, we will need more boots on the ground. it's putting himself nan unnecessary box, then you're right. the american people don't want to think that we're going to be in a long, protracted land war in iraq. he doesn't need to put unnecessary things off the table. >> very quickly, last word and we have to go. >> intelligence estimates about the danger of isis to our -- as an existential threat to the united states differ. yes, it's endangering our national security. the president didn't go there.

you talked to somebody else who said it could develop into a danger to our national security. until we figure out what that -- >> put everything on the table. >> we've got to go. s.e., thanks very much for coming in. gloria, jay, thanks to you as well. just ahead, nfl star charged with child abuse. now a report of a second alleged incident. details of a twist in the adrian peterson scandal. major announcement by nasa. the space agency wants to start doing something it hasn't done for several years. so what we're looking for is a way to "plus" our accounting firm's mobile plan. and "minus" our expenses. perfect timing. we're offering our best-ever pricing on mobile plans for business. run the numbers on that. well, unlimited talk and text, and ten gigs of data for the five of you would be... one-seventy-five a month. good calculating kyle. good job kyle. you just made partner. our best-ever pricing on mobile share value plans for business. now with a $100 bill credit for every business line you add.

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charges were ever filed. cnn hasn't been able to confirm the story. peterson is vehementally denying the report through his attorney. cnn's rachel nichols, host of "unguarded with rachel nichols." also joining us, senior legal analyst, jeffrey toobin and cnn anchor don lemon. explain what's happening here. how is all of this playing out over at the nfl? >> there's certainly some concern. adrian peterson was deactivated for this past weekend's games. then on monday, the vikings came out and said they were reinstating him and going to, quote, let his due process and this case play out. it will probably play out through the course of the entire season. he's not expected to go to any sort of trial on this until later in the year, possibly next year. that drew a pretty strong reaction, especially after that second report. well, yes, child services did not, in the end, have a finding of child abuse against peterson. peterson's lawyer is correct.

the mother was concerned enough, and there was an injury to the child that she did call child services and they did think it was warranted to launch the investigation. the fact that that even happened is yet another concern. and it's not just fans that are taking notice. radisson said it's suspending its sponsorship of the seem. you have also had the governor of minnesota weigh in, saying he thinks that the vikings should put peterson back on some sort of deactivation or suspension. you also have senator al franken weigh in and say the same thing. >> legally speaking, jeffrey, where does this play out? >> under texas law, a charge of child abuse, there is a defense if the conduct is reasonable by the standards of the community. so the question will be, if these reports are true -- as far as we know, they are -- that peterson used this switch and

injured his 4-year-old son, if this case goes to trial, and it probably will not. it will probably end in some sort of plea bargain. if it were to go to trial, the jury would have to decide, is that sort of treatment of a 4-year-old reasonable according to the standards of the community. clearly, spanking would not be a crime. but this use of a switch, at least the prosecutors and the grand jury thought this was a crime. >> switch. >> and that was the issue. >> being a branch or something like that? >> yeah. >> don, how do you think this is all playing out? >> well, i have to say that when i was a kid, i would have to go and get the switch off the tree. and if i brought back a switch that wasn't big enough, then my grandmother or my dad or my mom would go get a bigger one. listen, i'm not condoning what adrian peterson is alleged of doing, but, you know, people do discipline their children. when i saw the pictures, i thought if he did, indeed, do that -- or did that, i should say, excuse me, he should be

punished. that was beyond the pale. but people do punish their kids and corporal punishment happens in this country. it happened almost every single day for me as a kid in catholic school. and a lot of people see that as sort of a parent's right to discipline their children. we must look at it in context and must look at those pictures and figure out if adrian peterson did go overboard. >> those pictures you saw the pictures, i saw the pictures. they are pretty awful when you look at that little boy and the injures that clearly were suffered. rachel, rihanna -- there's the pictures right there. rachel, rihanna has a series of tweets, she put on a statement. cnn, you pulled my song last week. >> cbs. >> cbs, you pulled my song and now you want to slide it back in. you are all sad for penalizing me for this and in response cbs

said they are moving in another direction. how does this impact all of this? >> well, look, obviously this is one very complex side of a complex issue with domestic violence. i don't think rihanna is being punished for being a victim of domestic violence but i think her reaction after the highly publicized violence beaten by brown and afterward, the things she said in the press, the decision to go back and have a relationship with him, a lot of advocates of domestic violence said they didn't make her a great role model for young women maybe suffering that for themselves. that is a controversial position to take. you may not agree with it. but it is a position she has taken and you can understand cbs saying, you know what, the fact that there is controversy surrounding rihanna, we don't

want to put her front and center. she might be insulted by that but that is the way it is. >> we'll see you on saturday night, the anchor of unguarded. and i'm sure you'll follow up on this story and the major news of the day, jeffrey. we'll see you here in the situation room tomorrow. these are live pictures from the space station. nasa's big announcement on u.s. crews will be getting to and from space.

i don't know if you've ever taken the time to learn a little tiny bit of somebody else's native tongue? that opens up the doors to trust. my name is kanyon. i'm a technician here in portland oregon. every morning, i give each one of my customers a call to give them a closer eta. and when i called this customer, i discovered that he was deaf. then i thought of amanda. i've known american sign language since i was about 8 years old. it's like music for your eyes. and i thought that was an amazing gift to have, to be able to communicate with the deaf. my friend kanyon asked me to help him explain how today's appointment will go. he was nodding his head and giggling a little bit. i earned his trust that day, i guess.

-- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com nasa today announced it will

resume launching astronauts into space from the united states, something they haven't done since the end of the space shuttle program and it has cost almost $7 billion to do it. let's get more from our aviation analyst, miles o'brien. miles, explain what this move means for the future of the u.s. space program? >> well, the bottom line thing to take away from this is nasa made an important step toward launching u.s. rockets from u.s. soil carrying u.s. astronauts. something we haven't done since the last shuttle flight in 2011. we've been paying $70 million per seat for a ride on rockets to get u.s. astronauts on the space station. so this had boeing and space x develop rockets to carry astronauts and others to the space station is an important step. what is different this time, wolf, is instead of owning the

rockets, lock stock and barrel like they did in the old days. they will build the rockets and more or less lease them to nasa. it is in theory much cheaper for the taxpayer. >> is it a move designed with political ramifications to distance the united states from russia. >> those are concerns. people at the engineering and the policy level in the space world said it hasn't been much of a blip. but, yes, it is important for a lot of reasons, that the u.s. can maintain this capability. the fact that this gap is going to rock on for six years, post shuttle before this. and that is the soonest date, 2017, i think is a national embarrassment. but that is where we are right now. nasa is making the steps. and with the commercial entities stepping up to the plate and

involving themselves in risk and contracting it a different way and presumably doing it cheaper is a very good thing because it might open the doors to a whole new industry in space. >> we all know about boeing. tell our viewers what space x is. >> nasa hedged their bets on this. and boeing involved in every launch since the beginning of nasa, boeing or its previous companies. space x is eli musk who is the paypal and he owns the tesla electric car and solar city. he is into a lot of future-thinking ideas. space x has been very successful sending cargo to the international space station and the rocket they've developed, the dragon on top of the falcon 9 rocket has proven to be reliable. he thought about putting human beings aboard and he is part of the game now. >> miles o'brien, no one knows

the space business as much as he does. thank you very much. and you can follow us on twitter. tweet me at wolf blitzer or twit me at cnn sit room. i'm wolf blitzer in "the situation room". erin burnett starts right now. up front next, will american troops join the ground with isis. and the man kidnapped with steven sotloff is alive and talking tonight. and breaking news, ray rice and the players union appeal his suspension. could he be back on the field this season? let's go outfront. good evening. i'm erin burnett, outfront tonight, the breaking news, five more u.s. air strikes over iraq gh