>> schieffer: i'll bob schieffer and this is "face the nation". a setback for the iraqi government forces. and a key terrorist suspect is charged in the benghazi attackment a major offensive launched this weekend by iraqi government forces trying to turn back the isis militants outside the iraqi city has stalled. we are going to iraq for the latest and here in washington the suspect in the 2012 benghazi attacks that left four americans dead was formally charged in federal courtment we will talk to the chairman of the house homeland security committee michael mccaul and two key members of the senate west virginia democrat joe manchin and wyoming republican john barrasso. plus, analysis of all of this

and more. 60 years of news because this is "face the nation". captioning sponsored by cbs good morning wean we start with the news from overnight, the setback to iraqi forces in the city of kic tikrit. >> the situation is fluid and changing. the iraqi military launched its largest offensive yesterday. as of last night, iraqi state television said iraqi forces had cleared the city of militants. but this morning local security sources say that is not the case. the militants have been able to push iraqi government forces back something like 15 miles south in the fighting going on in and around tikrit. so they have not been able to go further and the offensive stalled. the iraqi militant spokesman

said the u.s. advisors have been helping to coordinate this offensive to the north and the iraqi got a boost of five russian fighter jets. >> charlie, do you think there is any chance that prime minister maliki is going to step aside or that he might reach out and try to form a more inclusive government as the suns urging him to do? >> certainly in interprets of stepping aside, nouri al-maliki said he will not do that. he will go through constitutional laws but he is not going to step aside and have an emergency government. in order to remain in power, he is going to have to build some broad coalition that will include the sunnies and will include the kurds and do something to piece this country back together. his political life is hanging by a thread. >> charlie keep your head down and thank you many and joining us now, the chairman of the house homeland security

committee republican michael mccaul of texas. mr. chairman thank you. we will get back to iraq in a minute. i want to ask you first about the arrest of ka tall la, the suspect in the be benghazi attad they arraigned him yesterday and they have been talking to him for 10 days. i know you have been briefed what they have been talking about. what can you tell us about that? how we gotten anything relevant from him. >> we know he has been talking but 10 days is not sufficient to fully debrief a terrorist in terms of the intelligence. my concern is this scenario is we are treating him a war prosecuting criminal cases, when we rush to interrogate we lose valuable intelligence in terms of who were the other suspects involved in benghazi? were there other threats to americans in the region but also to the homeland? and i'm concerned the

administration as valuing this rush to criminal prosecutions rather than trying to get the intelligence value out of this >> schieffer: what would you have done? put him before a military tribunal? >> i think the better route is take him we have the facility at guantanomo bay that could treat him as a war criminal rather than a criminal defendant. we have brought a criminal terrorist and given him due process under our constitution here in the united states in the national's capital. i do not think that is the right approach in prosecuting the war on terrorism. and to make it worse is the fact he was readily accessible that cnn interviewed him -- >> schieffer: so had cbs. and cbs as well. and now we are finding out the reason he was not apprehended as quickly is because we were so focused on building a criminal case rather than capturing the suspects who were responsible for the attacking benghazi and

killing our u.s. ambassador and three others. hat is shameful we have 12 other indictments and 12 suspects out there that the target list was made two weeks after benghazi yet we failed to move on that because we are intent on building a criminal prosecution. i am a federal prosecutorment but the military intelligence value outweighs a criminal case. >> and let me ask you about what is going on in texas right now. the heart rendering stories of the children coming across the border a lot from guatemala and the central american countries coming into texas being taken into custody there. what should be done about this? >> first, it is a crisis like nothing i've ever seen before at the border. we have refugee camps now in my and your home state of texas. it is a very serious concern. i don't think the flow will stop until a message of deterrence is

sent back to central america. the drug traffickers are making $5,000 a child on the children. advertising that if you get into the united states you can stay. and to some extent that is accurate. so i think that a image of deterrence and the president came out with a strong statement today. i applaud that. but i think you know, we have to be humanitarian and let them know if they come they cannot stay otherwise we will never stop the flow. >> and let's talk about iraq. you heard the grim report there. what needs to be done here? should this isis group should we do an air campaign and try to irradicate these people? >> well, i have been arguing for a dual strategy i have been talking to the experts. we don't want this to -- victory we had to be lost. now, we owe it to the gold star mothers. i think what we ought to be

doing, isis is the number one threat to the home land, the number one national security threat surpassed from the afghanistan and core al-qaeda call isis extreme if it gives you perspective. we need to look at one, targeted air strikes against isis without collateral damage to the sunnies. maliki, really blew his opportunity for five years to do that as did the president in my judgment. but i do think that is the final answer. we are seeing movement on the positive side of sunni tribal leaders trying to disassociate from isis because they are so extreme and shia cleric leaders saying that you need to talk to the sunnies and work this out. maliki has to go. i don't think it can happen with maliki in power. and they have to finalize the government at the end of this

month and the shias are starting to move towards that direction to a new leader. >> mr. chairman thank you for joining us. >> bob thank you for having me. schieffer: we want to go to aspen, colorado where we are joined by senator joe manchin, democrat out of west virginia a key member of the armed services committee. senator, thank you for joining us. i guess my first question is simple: what could or should the united states do next here? >> our main goal right now is to protect the embassy and the americans we have there. and the president has every right and the responsibility to do that. i'm fine with that. do whatever it takes to protect our people our embassy. and the bottom line is to make sure they are safe and secure. i believe the president has to come back to congress and should come back to congress and there is no appetite for us to get boots on the ground and get back into that country anyway shape or form >> schieffer: but what do we do about isis?

this group of terrorists? are you one of those that believes that they actually constitute a threat to the u.s. homeland if they are allowed to stay there? >> well, knowing that their intent what they have stated if you let them grow and breed and be able to have a training ground, absolutely. but we have shown the ability we can strike from afar. we don't have to be in the country if you will or occupation. and that what i believe and a lot of my fellow senators believe the same. we have proven and we said this before if military might or money would have solved that problem in that part of the world, and we could have made it better we would have done it by now. they are determined to have secretary moore to have a civil war. we would rather make sure we are not drawn into it taking sides because we will never get out. we have to let them know you show you are willing to do harm to americans we will do whatever

it takes to strike hard whether in syria or iraq wherever it may be. and that should be our goal and mission. it's very troubling trying to get pulled in and maybe we should be taking this side or the request for $500 million, i have a lot of problems with that, bob, and i for one do not support that unless i see other facts that would prove me wrong >> schieffer: what you seem to be saying here is if we think it is a threat to our national security we should be ready to go with air strikes, we should be ready to go with drone strikes and do whatever is necessary to protect the u.s. interests? >> bob, i agree with you on that. if they show, if there's proof that there is going to be threats to our country, we will do whatever we can to prevent that from happening. i'm all in support of that. right now we were told that before when we went into iraq way back in early 2000. that did not prove to be.

so right now people will be skeptical on that when we jump back into this thing. we are concerned about our allies and friends in jordan. and israel, our greatest partner if you will. we are watching all of these things but the bottom line for us to jump in and take sides and put money in there or air strikes or forces right now not knowing whot friendlies are or if any equipment we sent there will get in the hands of isis we exacerbate the problem. my main concern right now protect the embassy and the americans over there and take care of them no matter what happens. that is what i'm told we are doing and i support that if that is what they are doing. i do not support further aggression from the united states troops or our people being over there any other way shape or form because i think the iraquis have to take care of this themselves we spent enough time and effort and money.

>> schieffer: if maliki does not broaden his government and become more inclusive bring sunni s into the government can this be resolved or we can help? >> bob, i don't think maliki is going to change his ways. in 2011 de not want us there and we left. he had three years to bring that together and our people have been speaking with him and working with him and moving in that direction many maybe we did not push hard enough. anyone can make an evaluation of what happened but the man is resolved to do as he pleases and he stayed with his secretary shi'ites and that is where he wants to be. and until maliki goes i don't think you have any chance of bringing that together and i'm not sure it will happen after that. i think the lines will be redrawn and predictions other people made will show that it will be a different area and north africa than what we have today and the lines drawn 100

years ago will not be the lines when it's finished. and we for some reason do not want to accept that. >> schieffer: senator, thank you for a grim assessment but thank you for your candor. >> let me tell you we are still the best country on earth and we are going to protect our country and the people here. >> schieffer: thank you, sir. and from aspen and senator joe manchin a democrat we go to republican john barrasso a member of the senate represent leadership with us here in washington. boy, i don't think there's anyway you can markup joe manchin as being optimistic about this thing. what is your take, senator? >> i agree with the need to make sure our am wassy is protected. i see isis as a direct threat to the united states. they have the capacity and i believe they have the intent they have stated it in terms of their opposition to the western world. they are the richest most powerful and most savage group of terrorists in the history of

mankind and they have taken over an area the size of indiana bordering syria as well as iraq. it is a direct threat to the united states >> schieffer: what do we do about it and what can we do? >> there are a couple of things. maliki needs to go. number two, is i think we should be arming and should have been arming some of the opposition in syria. i would not negotiate with iran. they are not our friends. they will try to use this leverage to have a nuclear weapon but i do not think we should be the air power for iran coming in on the ground. and we ought to be developing american energy resources. and we ought to hit the stop the clock button on afghanistan in terms of withdrawing troops from there >> schieffer: stop withdrawing troops in afghanistan. >> yes, sir schieffer: i will get back to that. let me go back to this: do you see any chance that maliki will leave and can we really do much if he doesn't leave? >> he only has 24% of the votes

in -- going into the next system of parliament that starts july first. he needs to put together a government. sunnies and shias alike have come out against him. but if you want the kurds and the sunnies and the shias working together it cannot work with maliki. he is going to continue to go to others to prop him up. we see the russian planes coming in and he continues to go to iran. >> schieffer: what about the idea that vice-president biden advance early on that the country wakes up into three countries the kurdish section a sunni section and a shia section and they would be autonomousment is that the way this might workout? >> it may -- that may be what happens because we see the kurds in the northern area have taken kirkuk. i think they have had a long-term goal of being an

independent area themselves. that may be what happens here. i think it's in the best interest of the united states to have a stable iraq but we are not there now >> schieffer: how do you rate the president's handling of this thus far? >> well, when the president came into office in 2009 i think the world was safer than it is now. i think the president's decision to withdraw the united states to keep a campaign promise in iraq without leaving a stay behind force was a mistake. and i hear that from veterans in wyoming and parents who lost children fighting in iraq. we're seeing it around the world. when we the united states leaves a vacuum anywhere, that emboldens others to go in when there is no sense of deterrence by the united states that lets bad actors move in and fill the void >> schieffer: one thing we should make clear and be fair to the president he pulled the troops out when maliki refused to sign a status of forces agreement which meant that our troops on the ground remained

under the legal control of the united states. we have never put troops anywhere in the world unless we have the right to do that. that is what happened so we left. are you just saying we didn't push for that agreement hard enough? >> the president made a campaign promise that he would withdraw the troops and i believe he did not push hard to get that. he wanted to get this thing confirmed by the parliament. it would have been difficult to do. and now he said the word would have been good enough so the president is backtracking on his decision and the way he laid it out. >> schieffer: senator i thank you for being with us this morning. we are going to talk about this more and have analysis for the people who were there in a minute.

>> schieffer: we're back with margaret brennan taking a break

from her travels. time magazine's foreign affairs correspondent michael crowley and james jeffrey former u.s. ambassador to iraq. mr. ambassador, you have heard the discussion this morning. what would be the main point you would make right now? >> the most important thing is this is a national security emergency for the united states. president obama laid out how important it is as senator john barrasso says it is a possible civil war in the middle of the middle east. and it's even impact on our oil and energy security. so we need to act and we need to continue acting quickly. >> schieffer: here you have maliki who is not at the point of thumbing his nose at us at this point he is saying look i'm not making promises about being more inclusive here. can this thing work if he stays? >> it cannot work in my view if he stays but he has to win as

john barrasso said a majority in the parliament and it's not guaranteed he will do this because people are unhappy with his leadership >> schieffer: what happens margaret. you have been with the secretary of state and know what he has been pushing. where does he see this going? >> the u.s. is stopping short of asking maliki to step down every sunni country is saying he has to go for this to work. and the u.s. is focused on the process as the ambassador said which is this is going to become about whether maliki can get the votes. july first is when they start forming this government. and some of the sunni leaders said we are not going to start that process until you promise us that maliki is going to go. it remains to be seen how much we can get done in the next few days and secretary of state kerry is going door-to-door pushing the leaders to use their influence to peel away some of the sunni tribes and peel away the fertile ground laid for isis

to take hold >> schieffer: michael? you touch on the problem that this is a rubics cube that goes beyond baghdad and the borders of iraq. there is a game being played where the crucial players include the saudis, the iranians and it's important that people not forget syria. syria is the festering wound producing this infection that contaminated iraq where isis has drawn its strength, power and money and territory. so you saw president obama say i'm asking congress for $500 million for a pentagon program to arm and train the rebels. that is a reversal from his position in the past couple years where he says we don't want to get too involved. and secretary kerry met with the new quote-unquote moderate opposition leader. they are looking at that syria policy and say is that an important component of beating back isis and working with the

other regional actors. again it is a rub ins cube and -- rubics cube and get to go right is going to be hard >> schieffer: ambassador during iran-contra looking for moderate iranians in those days and we found out that there were not any. is it going to be possible to mount some kind of opposition on the isis people? because you say they are a threat to the united states in your view. where do we go from here? >> only if u.s. can go back 30 years, yes. there are plenty of people in iraq on all sides, sunnies and kurds and shias who will reach out to the other parties. there are many alternatives to prime minister maliki and sunnies actually hope for a unified iraq. i think we can move forward >> schieffer: hold that thought we are going to continue this conversation in the second half

of "face the nation" next up i will offer personal thoughts of my own.

>> schieffer: as we try to sort out where we are in iraq, only two things seem clear to me: we went there for the wrong reason and we left in the wrong way. when we were told saddam hussein had weapons of mass destruction i thought we had no choice but to go to iraq. that proved wrong. there were no such weapons. as young americans died in the country grew wary of war we announced our job was done. and we would be leaving. the administration wanted to leave a small training force of american soldiers behind. but iraq would not agree to let the troops remain under america's legal control and we have never put american forces anywhere under that condition. so we left. but did we push hard enough for such an agreement? or was that just an excuse for a war-wary america to get out? that like our reason for going

there will be a question for historians. and should be. world war one began 100 years ago this week and we are still debating what caused it. let us remember whatever the historians' judgment those who died in the long aago war like iraq will not come back to life. those scared by war is left with what war left them. it is said that war is an extension of politics but it is the failure of politics and only those we send to war know the awful cost that failure brings. back in a minute.

>> schieffer: some of our stations are leaving us now. most of you will be right back with more "face the nation", including our political panel with peggy noonan of the "wall street journal", michael gerson of the "washington post", former white house press secretary dee dee myers and author todd purdum. stay with us.

>> schieffer: welcome back to "face the nation" part two. and we are back with cbs state department correspondenting margaret brennan and michael crowley and james jeffrey. michael were you making the point that a lot of this goes back to syria. >> right. you think iraq is the president bush problem from hell it's problem from hell number two. the president was struggling to find some way to put a some water on this raging fire in syria which i think is producing the isis with the power and the ambition and the threat possibly to the western united states and storming into iraq now. part of what is happening here is how do we solve the political situation in iraq? what do we do about maliki? but i think the white house is look at syria and saying some of the critics saying we are not doing enough might be right.

and the president made a dramatic announcement asking congress for $500 million to train the syrian rebels. >> schieffer: what we have here now it seems to me now we are talking about aid to fight the syrian government but we don't want to tight the part of the syrian government that is bombing some of the isis people we are talking about iran and now you have got iran mixed up and we are going to became an arm of the iranian forces. i cannot remember when anything has been tangled up as this seems to be. >> it is. specifically when you look at the question of syria the regime backed by iran and the showdown of the arab governments that want assad to go and iraq it is tangled. but what you hear from michael about the change in the white house decision to ask for funding it is a choice without conviction on the part of the

president. it will take six to eight months to train the rebels under the program put forward to congress. but what you hear from diplomats in the region is they have been told the covert program may get stepped up you will see the aircraft come down and the rebels on the ground in syria are battling on two fronts. they are fighting assad who got stronger because of isis but they are fighting the extremists in isis. the ground that they have seeded has become the launch pad that they have gone into iraq from. there are two fronts for the u.s. to be looking at right now stemming the festering wound in syria and the new front within iraq. you cannot just address iraq here on the part of the white house they have to look at syria >> schieffer: mr. ambassador how do we separate who we want to give the aid to? and who we don't want to give it to? >> we know we have been working

with the moderate opposition for years and we have people on the ground that dealt for years with the syrian opposition and dealt for years with the sunnis in iraq. this is a budding regional confrontation between sunnis and shia. but if we act now for the people that want to avoid this we can move forward and have a much more active policy >> schieffer: i did not hear anybody joe manchin or john barrasso anybody in baghdad this morning that was optimistic about turning this thing around. tell me what has to happen? and do you see any reason that we can be optimistic here? >> optimism is in short supply in the middle east but i think the administration needs to step up its actment we should use military strikes against isis when they threaten the shia areas or baghdad. we need to accelerate rapidly and we have ways to do it, aid to the syrians and we need to be

more active with results not simply inputs. that is absolutely important right now because people are questioning our will. not our capabilities >> schieffer: what about that, margaret? do you see any indication within the administration that the president is ready to take strong action other than what we've heard announced? >> u.s. officials layout a scenario in which they are trying to create the most flexibility for the president that they can. up front, right now, we are gathering intelligence everyday for targets in iraq. we are not preparing strikes yet. this is not happening immediately. and they are making all of this leverage to get the iraqi government to act to form this new inclusive government. but most of the arab diplomats and the people i speak to do not think this is happening overnight. they put maliki in power for weeks here at least. and this process last time they tried to form an iraqi government took eight months or so. this is not going to be quick. the issue is the longer this

goes without trying to dig isis out they get embedded and it's hard to carry out strikes when you have people holding on to civilian areas. >> and one thing we could hope happen is that isis overplays its hand. al-qaeda affiliated radicals impose law and treated the local sunnis brutally when they were there during the american occupation and we got the sue any tribes to cooperate with us to chase al-qaeda out and we were able to decimate them. if isis does that again it could turn the local population and get greedy they will be stretched thin that is a way we can fight back and two if regional factors decide we want stability we are not going to fuel sectarian passions we are going to try to restore political stability and the borders, there could be daylight. but boy, it looks bleak right now >> schieffer: well, i think we will end it in and we will be

right back to talk about some domestic politics including how is hillary clinton doing these days with our political panel in a minute.

>> schieffer: well, we are going to have afallacies of some of the things we have been talking about and we are going to talk about some of the domestic politics and what is going on in this country. peggy noonan is with the "wall street journal", of course. michael gerson writes a column for the "washington post".

veterans of reagan and george bush white houses respectively he was a member of both before he became a newspaper reporter and another veteran dee dee myers served as press secretary to president clinton is about to head off to hollywood to takeover corporate communications for warner brothers. she is take along the guy sitting next to her who is todd purdum he is her husband and he has a terrific new book one of the best books i've read this year about the signing of the civil rights act in 1964 called an idea whose time as come and we'll want to talk about that a little. the first thing i want to talk about and get back to iraq. but hillary clinton, i must say has taken some heat about her book tour where she rolled out and amongst other things said they were dead broke when they left the white house. peggy, you had a scathing if i

may say so, review of the book and senator clinton's kind of book tour here. and so how is she going to turn this around? i don't think this was a good start for her, if i do say so. >> well, i think this was step one in a many-stepped process. i think mrs. clinton and her publishers were probably thinking look this is a book tour this is wonderful it's our opportunity to go out before select audiences and make an impression. but i think some mistakes were made. and i think the impression was not so great. the book got almost universally panned. it does not appear to be selling well or according to expectations. it wasn't essentially banal piece of work. it was not rivoting like some former secretary of state memoirs and histories.

and i think also that mrs. clinton found something that was probably a little surprising, and it was that the mainstream media which scrambled for interviews with her trying to get the first and the longest, they were not at her seat and they were not at her throat, they were distanced and they were probing and they brought out they gave fresh life to such stories as benghazi and got her to say the irs thing is a problem. so there was would be belliness that may have startled mrs. clinton and reminded her that running on a national scale is hard and she just started running. >> what do you think about it? i agree with what peggy said but i think the book got better reviews but she faced writing the book and selling the book the dilemma most secretary of states don't face she is still

an actor in the public arena and keeping up with the possibility of running for president and that clearly kind of puts fences around what she felt comfortable saying and how she had to talk about her past with an eye on the future. and i think they did start out thinking this is step one we are going to treat it like a book!2- (át not going to let this be a political campaign. and that proved harder than they expected. i think she spent four years in the state department where for the first time she was not treated like a politician and she liked that. and i think she wanted to keep that platform going longer and yet, first of all she is hillary clinton and second of all this is a political environment so she stepped back into the political fray. and again trying not to make it a campaign but realizing that is not possible and being hillary clinton everything is about politics. i think they have work cut out for them and it's not too late this is just the beginning of --

she is not having to declare anything yet. it's all fixable but they saw flaws that they need to go back and address >> schieffer: michael you worked inside and outside the white house what do you think this says about hillary clinton as the candidate? is this going to be tougher than some democrats thought it was going to be? >> her sputtering launch caused reminders for her. first she did not run a great campaign in 2008. she had a chaotic staff. she had high expectations. she was sometimes clumsy it is a reminder to people she is not bill clinton. she is not a perfect candidate. i think she has a strong resume and background but she is not a perfect candidate. and it is also a reminder that wealthy people have sometimes a tough time talking about money. mitt romney had that problem. hillary clinton seems to have that problem. without realizing it.

she explained that she earned her money through dissident of effort which -- dint of effort. so i think she has problems. she has to work on. i add she also has foreign policy problems. what does she distance herself from in the chaos of the middle east? she distanced herself from the syrian policy of the president which i thought was interesting the most interesting part of the book by the way in a not interesting book. does she need to do that on other issues as events in the middle east unfold. it will be interesting. >> schieffer: todd? one of the things was brought out mrs. clinton's resentment in the years her husband was making $35,000 a year as the governor of arkansas she was the bread winner and remembering worrying about paying tuition for chelsea's college and she has a resentful streak about the years

she sacrificed she is quite wealthy and makes $200,000 a speech but she remembers the hungry years and some ways that influences her very much >> schieffer: why is it people go into politics and resent the fact they are not making much money? >> this is not well walking to school in the snow. >> years ago she complained to dick morris why can't we have a swimming pool like most people do >> schieffer: and this is what arnold palmer said to tiger woods. and he said i cannot have a normal life. and arnold said give back the money. [laughter] and everybody went on from there. let's talk about something else here and that is this week we saw the president open a campaign as i understand it,

from what i read about it, to connect with people out in the heartland to connect with what is going on in real america. and i think at one point he was complaining that he wasn't getting enough publicity about sitting down in a cafe and talking to a lady about what her problems were. and i'm not sure how much publicity that was appropriate but that seemed to be he did not think he got enough. what is this all about? >> he also said he thought republicans were quote picking on him. which sounded a little bit childish. they are picking on you? here is what i thought presidents and their staffs get in an particular moments sometimes and they decide i know we are having trouble let's go here and talk about this. everything the president it seemed to me said, talked about or did in the heartland visit seemed to show a contrast

between what is really happening in the world and people are really worried about what is happening at the borders, the children, iraq, the jobs numbers, the economy, and he is having these sort of strange off-point conversations. it seemed not to mesh and it seemed to make him look worse like someone who is detaching and detached. >> and it shows the paradox of foreign policy polling. iraq and syria, the president's doing what americans want. he is not engaged but they don't like the result. the poll numbers are going down. americans may be disengaged with the world they don't want their president ambivalent and disengaged in the world. he cites the polling saying i'm focused on what americans care about. but they judge whether a president is strong in the world. they judge where whether

long-term american interests are being served. and it is a serious problem for him. >> deedee you are going to work for warner brothers you work with communications and helping people put their best foot forward. what would you advise this president to do? >> clearly people do want the president to take care of foreign policy so they don't have to worry about it because they have outsourced it to the president and his team and that is always been that. they want to know that he cares about them and their problems and this president has been a little hit and miss in that department campaigning, people feel like he understands the their problems and what is going on in their lives and they like him and have had high personal feelings about him and yet i think he tends to withdraw into the white house and not talking to people. and one of the things he needs to do more and i disagree he

seems detached is listen. i think the people expect the president to deal with foreign policy and be concerned with their problems. i'm happy to hear him listening to people and sitting down with somebody that says i work really hard we work several jobs and we are not getting ahead. i think people want to know that he is hearing from people like them with problems like them. it's not the only thing he is doing but it is a campaign season and they want to know that he hears and understands and feels their pain >> schieffer: let me ask you this, todd, because you have done this book and i want to talk about this your book on civil rights but a big part of the book was lyndon johnson and the president needs to be listening a lot of people on the hill democrats and republicans say the president ought to be listening to them and make more of an effort to build a relationship with not just republicans up there but with democrats as well. is that a fair? >> i think the democrats are

very undertended on the hill and the white house made an effort in the last few months under the new chief of staff and the congressional relationship to make more of an effort to set aside routine time for the president to reach out to members of congress. but de not do enough of that in the first part of his presidency. and one of the things president johnson did so well during the fight over the civil rights bill he called the southern opponents because he knew he would learn intelligence what was on their mind. and more information is better information. and president obama could certainly stand to pick up the phone and hear what people are thinking. >> schieffer: as you look back on that period what could today's politicians learn from the politicians of that day? because they did talk to one another. johnson knew he could not pass that bill without dirkson. what advice should they take away from what happened in 1964?

>> well, i guess the principle thing is just because something seems impossible doesn't mean it's impossible. the veterans of that bill, the surviving aides said we did not think we were not sure this could happen and because they worked at it and let it play out and let the opponents have their say, the energy changed because they kept their shoulder to the wheel. politics today is so different. the districts are so different. they are redder and redder and bluer. i'm not sure there's a good analogy. but i do thw.$ it is astounding that 50 years ago people did the right thing for the right reason and fundamental decency and common sense prevailed and that is always -- >> schieffer: peggy 30 seconds left. will we see that day again? >> goodness maybe we can profitably look at the past and histories like your book one of the things we can all learn from is mr. johnson who was a democrat, he got that great

legislation passed with republicans he had to ignore part of his party the democrats he picked off the republicans they backed him up. patriotism is a powerful force when honestly and ideallisticly unleashed by leaders that is part of what i see in your book. >> i hope we can find a way to be more like we used to be in those days. thank you all very much. and we will be right back. with thoughts about that civil rights bill and what it meant. >> you mess with mandel

schieffer: wednesday marks the 50th anniversary of day that lyndon johnson signed the civil rights act. a turning point in the struggle for equal rightsp a struggle that americans followed on the evening news broadcasts of the new media television. this is our "face the nation" flashback. in 1954, the supreme court ordered schools desegregated and three years later president eisenhower sent federal troops to enforeintegration of the schools. but it wasn't until a year after that, that the first

african-american, the head of the n.a.a.c.p. appeared on "face the nation". >> the questions reflected the at constitute of many white americans at the time. blacks felt wanted too much too soon. >> why this haste on your part? because it's too long there are two million negro children at the end of each segregated school year is being denied an opportunity to prepare properly for life. >> the movement gathered momentum in the 60s and we saw the horror of the police dogs in birmingham as a young reporter i saw the violence at ol' miss when james meredith became the first african-american to enroll there. "face the nation" played host to the strongest advocates and those just as determined to stop the movement.

after demonstrators were severely beaten in selma, alabama in 1965, governor wallace argue to do could have happened anywhere. >> there's only been one instance in all the weeks and months of provocation in this state that the police force of alabama have been charged or stated by the justice department to have been engaged in police brutality. i think that is a good record for the alabama state troopers. >> schieffer: for all his bluster, wallace could not overcome the public revolumion to the pictures coming out of the selma horrors and that led congress to pass stronger legislation in 1965. laws the enabled blacks to vote many for the first time in their lives. our "face the nation" flashback.

>> schieffer: that's it for us today. thank you for watching "face the nation". tune in to cbs this morning tomorrow with the latest news from iraq. we'll see you next week. captioning sponsored by cbs captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

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