i say it in the context of adversary to allergy. and our own, what are they doing to cope with it? >> james clapper on his life and career in the intelligence community today at 6:30 p.m. eastern on c-span. with the impact of the white from chief of staff to "washington journal" this is an hour. whipple, the documentary filmmaker and writer who has written this book titled "the gatekeepers." good morning. guest: thanks for having me. host: let's start off with this term, gatekeeper. we are talking about white house chiefs of staff. guest: the modern empowered

iste house chief of staff first famously the gatekeeper, which means giving the president time and space to think. he is the broker of information, he made sure everything is teed up with information on every side. takinghe heat shield, the incoming artillery for the president, getting all the blame and none of the credit. at the end of the day, the chief of staff is someone the president counts on to execute his agenda. him importantly, to tell what he does not want to hear. host: you begin the book by writing about what appears to be an extraordinary answering of chiefs of staff from the past. they were meeting with rahm emanuel, who was working for barack obama.

tell us about that meeting. extraordinary scene that took place in december 2008, when rahm emanuel was about to start is barack obama's chief of staff. we were on the verge of the great depression. two wars, a bloody stalemate. it was a real crisis and former white house chiefs of staff on every side of the aisle from the cheney to leon penn at a came to the what -- leon penn at a came to the white house. they gave him the best advice on how to be chief of staff. they finally got to cheney, who was the sitting vice president at the time. he looked up over his glasses costs, control

your vice president. that brought down the house considering his reputation. >> would have the phone number at the bottom of the screen. chris whipple is the author of the gatekeepers. we have the line for democrats and republicans and independents . more about the importance of the chief of staff, you write a couple of short passages i want to share. when government works it's because the chief understands power. tell us more. guest: it's hard to overstate the importance of the role. there is nothing in the constitution about it. he is hired and fired by the president alone.

it, the whiteut house chief of the second-most powerful job in government. dick cheney ought to know. he said the chief has more power than the vice president. it's true except when cheney was vice president. the white house chief has to translate the president's agenda into reality. that was lacking in donald trump's first year. white houseun the like trump tower with people coming and going. that was the fundamental problem, or one of several, but a major problem for donald trump in his first year. host: you write that when government fails it can be triggered to shortcomings of the chief.

the stakes could not be higher. you interviewed 17 living white house chiefs of staff. is there a common denominator among those men? guest: but me give you an example of the stakes. to answer your question, consider when james baker after four years was burned out as reagan's chief of staff and was desperate to get out of the job. treasury secretary said why we swap jobs. inwas the most disastrous history of american politics. it's no coincidence that after don reagan became white house chief, the iran-contra scandal bubbled up from the basement. stakeker would have put a in that immediately. i don't think it would've ever happened. some of the qualities that are important our judgment, being

grounded, being comfortable in your own skin. data --r and leon and paneta were guys who could walk into the white house and tell the president what he did not want to hear. host: you have pictures in the book of bob halderman in his office. how did mr. haldeman create a model? what was in place before that? with: i could have begun eisenhower in the book. one of the things that shocks me is nobody beat me to this book. it's extraordinary when you think about it that no one had looked at this history in quite this way before. you could go back to sherman adams, the civilian version of

dwight eisenhower's army chief of staff. he was known as the abominable snowman. man. haldeman took it to another level. they were obsessed with trying to get this right. again in nixon's words, the lord high executioner. he was the guy who was the gatekeeper, he brokered information and was in charge of communications. he was the guy who executed the president's agenda. the fascinating paradoxical thing about it is haldeman who wrote the template for the water and white house chief failed in the end spectacularly to speak truth to power during watergate, which was richard nixon's downfall. host: we will take calls now for chris whipple.

we will put the numbers on the bottom of the screen. you said this type of book is not been done before. why did you decide to do it? was a phone call out of the blue from a stranger. he is a documentary filmmaker .ho had done 9/11 they want to know if i would partner with them on a documentary. we did that for the discovery channel. that it barelyme scratch the surface of this unbelievable tour -- untold story of the chiefs who make the difference between success and disaster for every presidency. host: our first color is from auburn, washington. good morning. i would say a profound instrument of this, gatekeeper

is the appropriate word, is integrity. i think we are seen it especially in general kelly, the notion of not only trying to be a gatekeeper but also a zookeeper, using his military method ofd organized variousg it to assemble factions in the white house. often be diverse in their affiliations. toy can get the president focus, to try to prevent them from doing foolish things on twitter. it's not easy to stand up to the president of the united states. to do that in a way and use camaraderie is special and i think somebody who has a military experience, that kind

of advisor is even made more effective than somebody who has pure political experience. thank you for writing the book. host: they read zookeeper. tell us more. guest: in the case of john kelly, someone close to donald trump told me this was almost like fred trump reaching from beyond the grave, that john kelly is the son trump wished he had. gravitas, heity, has donald trump's respect. he has made the trains run on time in the west wing. that is the easy part of any successful white house chief of staff. the easy part is organizing the west wing. the hard part is walk into the oval office, closing the door, and telling the president hard truth.

i think his record there is really mixed. this is general kelly back in october. >> i would just offer to you that as i read all the time consistently, i'm not quitting today. i don't believe and i just talked to the president i'm being fired today. i am not so frustrated in this job that i am thinking of leaving. this is the hardest job i've ever had. this is the most important job i've ever had. it is not the best job i ever was when i wasob an enlisted marine sergeant. that was the best job i ever had. what is working and not working? kelly told peter baker in

the new york times he was not put on the earth to manage the president. that is true, but it's misleading. ofbetrays a misunderstanding what the most important part of the job is. it's not to control the president, it's to tell the president when you think he is doing things that will harm the agenda. he is there to help the president governor. you mentioned the crazy tweets to continue unabated on kelly's watch. performance with the goldstar widow, when he started in the pressroom with this eloquent description of how soldiers are prepared for burial and then segued into that unhinged tirade the false against representative wilson,

that showed that he might be out of his depth politically. we can talk more about that. callsbefore we go back to , he remains unconventional did we go to dan in corpus christi, an independent caller. caller: happy new year to both of you. how is this relevant to a current middle school are, someone in the ninth or 10th school, they are so uninformed. how could you ever make this relevant, that it is so important? that's a great question. i think that so much of being a white house chief of staff is

really common sense, much of it is being grounded in having good judgment. was one of the unsung but really effective chiefs of staff under jimmy whenr during his last year carter finally realized he had to have an effective white house it's, jack watson said almost everything you need to know in kindergarten. it's not complicated. it requires an ability to work with people. haldeman's sonbe as he was described by richard nixon. you have to be able to inspire a team and you have to be able to reach across the aisle. that's the simplest way i can put it. on the coverhipple

of the book. this is during the final year of the presidency. the book is called "the gatekeepers." he is in new york city. we have an independent caller from little rock, arkansas. good morning. caller: this is a great topic. whipple, chris whipple, is that right? bookyou ever heard of this i just found it in my little private library here? guest: i know it very well. caller: it is similar to yours. in 1979.ut guest: that's right.

it's a very good early study of some of the closest advisers. so muchout well before of our recent history. it came out before ronald reagan picked james baker as his chief of staff. bar i thinkt the for chiefs of staff who followed. it's a very good early book on the subject. caller: he loved all of the early presidents -- lumped all of the early presidents together. starting in 1857, that was the modern day making of the presidential candidate -- cabinet. he said when george washington a fewesident, he had

positions. they kept adding to it later. guest: the government has gotten much more complicated and unwieldy. it's fascinating to me as you point out, the early presidents didn't have a chief of staff. they didn't have somebody that was equal in the white house. that is a modern phenomenon. haldermanck to and nixon. what i discovered doing the book was every president since the end has learned sometimes the hard way you cannot govern effectively without an empowered white house chief of staff that is first among equals to execute your agenda. host: you touched on james baker, james baker and ronald

reagan. what made jim baker so effective? guy, he had the secret sauce. he was as smooth as silk. he was 50 years old when he took the job. he had nothing to prove to anybody. he was confident, he knew capitol hill. he had white house experience. he could walk into the white office,o into the oval and tell ronald reagan what he didn't want to hear. he did it often. ronald reagan was hell-bent right out of the blocks to tackle social security reform. that's what he wanted to do is is the item. baker went in and sat down with them and explained, mr.

president, it's the third rail of american politics. if you touch it you will be electrocuted. with baker'sd advice and wound up doing tax cuts and the economy and the rest is history. aat is the kind of thing savvy white house chief of staff with political skill can do. it's not clear that john kelly has that kind of skill. a caller on the line from maryland. hello. caller: how you doing today? to touch on what the caller from earlier, the new generation is woefully ignorant of history of the white house. you said you were surprised no one beat you to this. we are dealing with the

president and the system in place that is more modernized. presidents were willing to listen a bit more and work with each other. advicetion is this, what presidentest for our and his cabinet, his chief of , to not onlyorward bring in the old ways, but to take those tradition and do something more than what they are doing with it now, instead of falling all over the place? question,answer your i would say based on the history that i researched on the presidents and white house

chiefs, this is not the first time a president has arrived in hubris, office flip thinking he's the smartest guy in the room and convinced he could govern the way he campaigned, it's a fundamental mistake. in hollywood, they say nobody knows anything. in washington, nobody learns anything. trump is taken this to another level. let's assume for the moment he has learned the first big lesson , that he had to empower a white house chief. he has done that to some extent with john kelly. the second major lesson is you -- there is a huge difference between campaigning and governing. about demonizing and governing is about coalition. it's about building something larger than your base. there is no evidence donald

trump has learned that lesson. john kelly needs to help them get here. host: this is the opinion of steve on twitter. he said john kelly stopped the leaking. that's the major reason he's there. true: i don't think that's at all. i think the leaks continue unabated. you don't stop leaks by intimidating or threatening or being a tough general as it were. the way you stop leaks is by running a white house staff where there is respect, discipline, and when you tell the truth. that's how youk prevent leaks. you're never going to prevent them completely. there will always be leaks. that was certainly true even with successful two-term presidency's.

i don't think kelly has stopped the leaks. host: we move on to barbara in red bank, new jersey. caller: good morning. to thistening conversation and the first thing shouldcurs to me is they not be seen or heard. a lot of the problems we have had with chiefs of staff have of theirrect result being too close to the forefront of politics. i've been around for quite a while. i did not know chiefs of staff when i voted for eisenhower. i knew of james baker by reputation. rahm emanuel was a little bit too cozy with the press i thought. have anythingt to

but the entrance and exit to the oval office. believe that rather than making any changes that are positive for trump, trump has turned john kelly. i want to thank mr. whipple, this is a great book and i am buying it tuesday morning. host: mr. whipple? guest: that's a very good point. it used to be the case back in , there was a's study by the executive branch in which it was recommended advisors have a passion for anonymity. that's not really possible anymore. the white house chief does occasionally have to go on the sunday talk shows and advance

the president's agenda. i would agree that some chiefs have gotten into trouble by being too visible and seen too often. frankly, that grandstanding performance in the press briefing about the goldstar widow was an example. he hasn't done that lately. at the end of the day, he needs to be able to tell donald trump hard truths. he doesn't have to be invisible. he has to be a truth teller. host: in chapter eight, you write about the decider. andrew carr had a very challenging experience as chief of staff. how come? guest: i think it's a fascinating case when you think sont george bush 41 and his

george bush 43. it's fascinating to me because i think george w. bush did not a powerful white house chief of staff like jim baker. he had seen how successful baker was under reagan. i think w wanted to run the white house himself to some extent. i think andy card did the best he could. i think he was not empowered in quite the same way that jim baker was under reagan or leon cannata was under bill clinton. there were some very powerful characters in that white house, dick cheney and don rumsfeld and others. i think it was a tough challenge for him. i think you did very well under the circumstances. host: let's hear from mike in

modesto, california. mike is a democrat. caller: i have a list here for general comments. must be our savior or john the baptist. this crappy pulled with that black congresswoman, straight up lies about what she was trying , thatabout our servicemen was bs and that guy is a pos. rate andke your hourly weekthe zero, that's a 50 year. $80,000,dy makes that's $40 an hour. that's a little favor to you.

the big thing is this: opting of the trump voters ago to these rallies. those money people do not give anything about gay marriage, jesus, any of that. they just use you to get the votes and they are going to do whatever they want. host: mike, thanks for calling. is there anything there you want to respond to? guest: there is a lot there obviously. i will address what he said about kelly. think it's a challenge for anyone to work that closely with donald trump. i think quite frankly no matter who you are, even if you're a four-star general, everyone in the orbit of this death start on

his donald trump is sucked in and to some extent tainted. i can't help but think that misfire by kelly when he went into the briefing room was a case of trying to please the boss. he really stepped out of line. that's what i would say to that. host: this is one of the headlines about trump family members. this is from back in late november. john kelly wanted jared kushner and i ivanka trump to leave the white house by the end of the year. we know about news reports with the first family. speak to us about chiefs of staff and family members and access. how is that gone over recent history western mark -- history? guest: it's an extraordinary

challenge when family is involved. it's a delicate tightrope act. challenge, nancy reagan was famously known as the personnel director in the reagan white house. the deputy chief of staff who was the maestro of image making for ronald reagan was like a son to reagan. baker was smart enough to know that. he really recruited. when baker, who was considered a pragmatist by his enemies, the guy who would not let reagan be reagan, when he came under attack, he was able to fight back. he had nancy in his corner. i think he was able to be effective as a result. you have to be very savvy to have against

those currents where family are involved. host: jason is calling from maryland, what county when? caller: i'm right outside coping to. host: got it. caller: i think you have to be careful and i think both you as host and your guest are careful about what he has written. he has written a book about the recent history of the chief of staff. it should not be used for what they should be or do. they are not mentioned in the constitution. the chief of staff should be the chief of the staff in the white house. not the chief of the cabinet.

the fact that the presidency has to use a chief of staff as a confidant rather than the vice president or any of his trusted cabinet, it shows a weakness in the presidency and a weakness in the reliance on the vice presidency. guest: i just have to cut you off here. i have to disagree with that. if you look at history, it proves otherwise. history is littered with the bones of residencies that did not realize you had to empower achieved to get things done. arguably thewas most intelligent president of the 20th century, he was trained as a nuclear engineer. he thought he could run the white house himself without an empowered chief. ronald reagan was once described unfairly as an amiable dunce. understoodit never

and the donald trump didn't understand. that is an outsider president needs a insider to get things done on capitol hill. that's just the reality of modern history, the modern history of the presidency since the. host: two robert in a greenville, texas, an independent caller. chris whipple is up in new york. caller: it's a very good show this morning. it's hard to imagine someone with such a wonderful career getting involved with an organization like the trumps and evil it is presenting the united states with. god,an independent but my we need to be fearful of the inequality in the united states

and trump just exacerbates that with his rhetoric and the elites he surrounds himself with. kelly, he's got to go out and try to play that up. it's going to be the downfall of america. we need to be careful. host: thank you, robert area guest: to that point, it's a real dilemma for anyone who serves this president. it's hard not to be damaged, it's hard not to be tainted by of thisthe excesses president. in kelly's case, i believe he believes in duty and honor of country. he is a marine who wants to take the hill. he is somebody who obviously and it as a challenge

whether he wants to admit it or betweenis the thin line this president and disaster for us all. when richard nixon was wandering the halls, talking to the oil portraits and drinking heavily at the height of watergate, alexander haig and the defense secretary major the nuclear codes were safe. those are the kind of things that john kelly other he likes or not has to think about. advisedhe would be well to pick up the phone and talk to and penn at a and jim baker ken duberstein and previous chiefs of staff, he's got a very difficult challenge. chris whipple is

a writer and documentary filmmaker. he is a producer at cbs news on the 60 minutes program. he is the author of this book, "the gatekeepers." he is joining us from new york. in chapter nine of the book, you speak about president obama's for chiefs of staff. you begin with rahm emanuel. he was in for a relatively short amount of time, but had a lot to accomplish. tell us about that. audit it was such an couple, no drama obama and rahm emanuel, who is quite a character. was a pretty good choice for president obama. remember, this was a moment of

real crisis. we were on the verge of a great depression. we had it frozen around the world. where staffl moment had to be done. obama had to pass the stimulus. rahm emanuel new the hill intimately. nobody knew capitol hill better than he did. he was in line to become the first jewish speaker of the house and reluctantly took the job as white house chief. they got a lot done, including as ugly as it might have been in the process, including obamacare. i think he had a successful run. i think he was good at it. tellingot shy away from barack obama what he thought. they had a real battle over health care. he want to go with something

more modest and less ambitious, obama won that argument. he saluted and went ahead and got it done. what is the average length of service of a white house chief of staff? , sot: it is so grueling unrewarding, so thankless. the average tenure is less than two years. host: two years. afterdo they typically go serving in that position? is it something they do at the end of the career? famously in rahm emanuel's case, he left to run for mayor of chicago. he won that election. not that many chiefs have gone on to careers. dick cheney did.

variety of jobs. there is no single pattern. what is fascinating to me about the book is this cast of characters that aaron sorkin could not dream up, from don rumsfeld and cheney to rahm emanuel, they are a fascinating group of characters. host: let's move on to jersey city. john is on the line for democrats. caller: thanks for c-span. i want to touch on, you touched on the carter administration's chief of staff. what role or responsibility do they have in the ineffectiveness of that presidency? guest: sure. the carter story is fascinating to me.

brilliant, is a brilliant man, trained as nuclear engineer. he could absorb enormous amounts of information and distill into policy. he was brilliant at all of that. his big mistake going into the presidency was thinking he didn't need a single empowered white house chief to help him. this wasn for that was right after watergate. men,w the example of older -- halderman, who personified wire gate. -- watergate. this rubbed carter the wrong way. it turned out to be a mistake. 2.5 years in, with his agenda paralyzed, he realized he had to

picked theebody he de facto chief who did not want the job. , awas famously disorganized terrific strategist, but not cut out for the job. it wasn't until his final year could carter picked jack watson to replace him jordan. was a former marine, much younger. he was very organized and smart. he was effective as white house chief, but it was too late for carter. host: in the epilogue to the book, it's crucially important. he was carter's final chief. everything, the president's relationship with congress and the cabinet, the integrity of the decision-making process, the way decisions are explained and implemented.

two i believe the modern presidency requires that kind of chief of staff? i am fatty do. we are moving on to gary in north carolina. caller: i just want to remind whipple, he is a very bright person. there are a lot of people out there who have access in the media and for trade their thoughts. brightest people. we don't go to school to learn to filter out things. we watched news programs for a little while and get the opinions of somebody else and use them as our own. we don't really do our own thinking anymore. exuberant the most tells us things we want to hear and we follow. we want to go with people who

agree with us. we don't humble ourselves to look at the other side of things. our leaders are once on the news. they wind up becoming our political leaders because we listen to what they say. us. really hard for theing the voting booth and situation we have now, it's like we should take a competency test before we let people vote. the intricate things that mr. , it is so describing interesting and voters don't have any idea of this for themselves. it's good to have a program like your's it shows us these things.

we are in the situation because we are not experts at this. host: thank you for calling. mr. whipple? guest: i think it's not that complicated or intricate really. ist it really boils down to our presidents effective or not? if you look at recent history president,d to the -- nixon to the president, patterns come through. the first year of trumps presidency is a perfect example of how you cannot govern the way you run a manhattan real estate firm. you cannot govern with people coming and going and nobody empowered to get things done it. nobody is empowered to tell you what you don't want to hear. that role is all the more important when you have the

president with no idea how to govern. we see the results of that. voters say.what host: this is more from john kelly from october. paper that i've been a failure at controlling the president, or controlling his tweeting. i was not sent in or brought to this job to control anything but the flow of information to our president so he can make the best decisions. is ae found that mr. trump decisive guy. he is a very thoughtful man. he takes information from every avenue he can receive. -- restrict the one

from seeing him. we go in and help them what hevely understand needs to understand to make these vital decisions. i was not sent into control him. you should not measure my effectiveness as a chief of staff by what you think i should be doing. the fact is i can guarantee you he is now presented with options, well thought out options that are discussed and detailed with his team. he comes up with the right decision. host: richard cohen wrote this in the washington post. he must be exhausted is the headline. what do you think year two of the trump presidency looks like? guest: let me just say in response to what you just played

from general kelly, with all respect to him, the job is much more than just simply controlling the flow of information, presenting options and information to the president. that's the staff secretary's job. the chief's job goes well beyond that. i would suggest general kelly pick up the phone to leon put on it. pick up the phone to jim baker. it's the tell him that easy part of the job. is walking into the oval office, closing the door, and telling donald trump what he doesn't want to hear. it's part of the job. that's what successful white house chiefs who want to have two term presidencies, that's what they learn to do. david is calling from

longview, texas. he is an independent collar. you were on with mr. whipple. caller: with bill clinton's reputation, wasn't a failure to let him be alone with a female in the oval office? guest: possibly. that's the answer to the question. think it's really impossible, even though the white house chief is the gatekeeper, you can't completely control the president and you can't completely control every person he sees. we see this even now with donald trump, he picks up the phone and he calls bannon, his former strategist. he calls reince priebus. of people inkinds it kelly can't control those conversations.

in fairness to bill clinton's chiefs, i don't think is possible to really police bill clinton in that way. difficult, that scandal. get clintono through that time. i know it was painful for bowls. for the white house staff. they felt betrayed by clinton. mike is calling from missouri on the republican line. caller: good morning. staff isn'ted the wearing heavy sunshade so they're not minded by your brilliance. is, you areto you typical of many of the lemmings

i see on c-span. all you do is criticize. if you had come up with something that would be helpful, while you apply to be chief of staff? with your political savvy i'm sure you would really help. why don't you run for political office? let me respond. let me go way out on a limb here and just suggest that you probably haven't read the book. i don'td realize that have all the answers and i don't pretend to. to be very evenhanded between democrats and republicans. i have decided democrat and republican as two people i think were the outstanding white house chiefs.

i have no ax to grind here. my book is really about governance, it's about what works in the white house. , i simplyue respect suggest you pick up the book and read it. host: and is calling from georgia. caller: how are you this morning? thank you for taking my call. i have one question. my call got dropped. i think i was banned from calling for a while. to get back to why i'm calling is my view on general kelly he has two basic problems doing the job. his great respect for the chain of command. i think he really is hampered of his i do it donald

trump is that commander in chief. i think he comes from a different point of view. i think he also has another problem, he is old-school marine. my husband was a marine. i understand that. he was a marine before the services became more diversified and accommodating to women and other types of personalities. i think he remains somewhere in that past experience with diversity. i think is reflected in some of the things he says. i'm curious to know what you think about that. guest: i think that's a very interesting comment. it's quite possible. i really don't want to

psychoanalyze john kelly. that's not my job. there is certainly the possibility that sometimes generals want to salute the commander-in-chief. that's a real possibility. donald kelly clearly has trump's respect. he has the gravitas and the dohority, the confidence to all of what i've been saying he should do. he needs to tell the president hard truths. he seems reluctant to do that. does itsible that he much more often than we realize and the trop simply goes on and does what he wants to do. i'm reluctant to psychoanalyze them. i think that's an interesting comment. rider host: this is a photograph of a young dick cheney.

this is when he became chief of staff, conferring with president ford. remind us about what president ford was facing and what dick cheney brought to the table. guest: in my mind, this was one of the great chapters in the book because there was a model that he wanted to put into practice, like the 26th floor of trump tower, calling it the spokes of the wheel with all senior advisers reporting to the president at the center. it was a disaster. excel toe month, ford was learning by fire hose, overwhelmed, as he put it. he had no time to think and make decisions. friend, up baking his ambassador of nato at the time, to whip the white house into shape, which rumsfeld did.

he brought along his protege, a 34-year-old guy who probably could not have passed an fbi background test. he had a couple of dwis. he flunked out of college twice. his name was dick cheney. he ultimately became chief of staff, succeeding runs field -- rumsfeld, was, believe it or not, the most popular guy in washington. he was self defacing. he -- self-defacing. --had a dry cell of humor sense of humor can you could bring people together and find bipartisan solutions. ever since the white house chiefs have said, what happened to that guy? it is a fascinating story. both rumsfeld and cheney.

missouri, call, in roberts, independent caller. caller: hi. i am interested in who the gatekeeper was during the reagan presidency when he signed off on selling armaments to the iranians. guest: sure. that is a great question and it goes to the heart of how consequence of the job can be because it is a perfect example. ronald reagan's white house chief was burned out and wound up swapping jobs with the treasury secretary. well, this was one case where nancy reagan's usually infallible instincts for personnel choices failed her miserably. don reagan was the former cochair of show of lynch.

he was oblivious. he liked to have his arrival in . room announced ladies and gentlemen, the white house chief of staff. he became a laughingstock shortly after taking over and shortly after he became white house chief, the iran contra scandal bubbled up. it was hatched in the white house basement. it was the kind of thing that jim baker never would have permitted, in my opinion. so i do not think it is a coincidence that the iran contra scandal erupted on his watch. it never would have happened on jim baker's watch. ultimately, howard baker a sickly had to pick up the pieces after don reagan -- had to pick up the pieces after don reagan was fired and they were instrumental in recovering from

it. host: barbara, texas. republican caller. caller: thank you. it is been -- interesting to hear your comments. of theheard one republican and i will ask the moderator who determines that. is a session i have been listening to. he has degraded our president for his judgment in every way i can hear, as well as kelly. the people that you praise the highest are our lowest presidency at. only to prove superseded by obama -- to be superseded by obama. i think -- host: barbara, we did talk about jim baker. respect, iara, with have said constantly and

consistently that the gold standard as white house two. was james a baker the roman 3rd white house chief of staff was james baker and also instrumental in helping reagan recover from the iran-contra scandal. some of the best white house cheney,rumsfeld, dick republicans, so if you read the book, i hope you will with an ton mind, the curse i tried research and write it with an open mind. host: barbara, what about that feedback is to mark caller: i -- feedback? caller: i appreciate you have highlighted the good staff reagan had, but i think you are seeing the reason we have trump. tax hear you talk about his

reform, and trying to keep our borders safe, and that is why [indiscernible] bashing him. host: our last call from arkansas, democratic caller. good morning, keenan. caller: hello. how far back does your book go, mr. whipple? physical back to woodrow wilson and earlier? guest: no, the book begins with the nixon era and his empowered white house chief. the reason for that is i could have gone back earlier to eisenhower, who had sherman adams as his gatekeeper, but the reason for it is, as i have said, there is nothing in the constitution about a white house chief of staff.

the position did not exist until modern times. it originated with eisenhower but went to another level with nixon and alderman, which is what i started there. it is a rich history from there until the president. if you asked all of the 17 living white house chiefs, 18 if you count reince priebus, i think they will all tell you -- bobb haldeman haldeman really wrote the template for empowered white house chief. whipple, writer, journalist, speaker, past producer of 60 minutes is the author of this book titled "the gatekeepers: how the white house chief of staff defined every presidency." thank you for your time. guest:

washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. on new year's day, we are taking your calls, asking what is your message to washington in the new year? in onts will weigh pending issues and 2018. be sure to watch c-span's washington journal live at seven eastern monday morning. joined the discussion. >> the hill to newspaper reports details of the president's tonight have not been announced, but it's been a long-standing tradition to attend the new year's eve celebration at the president's mar-a-lago country club in florida, where he has been vacationing this week. ticket prices are $600 for members and 750 for nonmembers.