al qaeda target but also of course resulted in the loss of innocent human lives. those hostages. >> you make up a great point about the balance. we hear more about the failure than the success. kelly, thanks so much and thanks for watching "the cycle" is coming to your way live in washington right now. >> welcome to "the cycle" we're live from washington, d.c. right now. ♪ breaking right now, we're here in d.c. as the president marks a milestone in u.s. intelligence despite the quality and use of that intel coming under attack. >> lessons that can be learned and any improvements and changes that can be made. i know those of you who are here share our determination to continue doing everything we can to prevent the loss of innocent

lives. i was asked by somebody how do you absorb news like that we received the other day? and i told the truth, it's hard. we don't take this work lightly. and i know that each and every one of you understand the magnitude of what we do and stakes involved. >> it's been ten years since the office of the director of national intelligence first bridged more than a dozen u.s. agencies under one guard. the goal of the post 9/11 reorganization was to prevent another attack through better information sharing. so far it seems to be working. there hasn't been a major terror attack on u.s. soil since then but the white house's admission on thursday that ci axt doen strikes inadvertently killed an american hostage and italian hostage and two terrorists is

raising questions about the program. kristen, we just heard the president at the dni offices, what were the big takeaways for you? >>. >> reporter: first you heard president obama praise the work they've done over the past ten years, and fact that the intelligence helped lead to osama bin laden and helped confirm that the syrian government used weapons against its own people and became enkridably emotional when he talked about the tragedy, two hostages killed in the recent drone strike president obama vowing to review what had happened and saying that we all bleed when there is a loss of american life. these are some of the most emotional comments we have heard him make about this tragedy to date. in terms of those reviews under way, i can tell you there are two, one is the internal administration review. this happens whenever there's a counterterrorism operation, the other is a second one that president obama has asked for. he asked the inspector general to investigate what happened. and among the key questions, can

you united states government do a better job of communicating and helping the families of hostages. we know in this case dr. weinstein's family was disappointed to some extent to the u.s. government. today during the white house press briefing josh earnest talked about the possibility of a fusion cell a way to stream line the communications between the united states government and the families of hostages. right now a number of different agencies communicate with those families and it can be confusing and not all together helpful. the other key questions that need to be answered why didn't the united states know there were two hostages there? does the obama administration and administrations moving forward need to overhaul this counterterrorism policy? if you speak with intelligence officials and lawmakers on capitol hill, they will tell you this counterterrorism operation was carried out to the book by the book i should say. that raises the question do they need to change the fundamental protocols in place,

those are among the key questions that need to be answered. the drone program has expanded significantly under president obama and started under george w. bush but drone strikes have expanded by about ten times in some of these places like pakistan syria, and also somalia and yemen. so those are going to be among the big questions that need to be answered and the focus, does this drone program need to be overhauled. >> thank you very much for that. let's bring in senior daily beast correspondent shane harris at the new america foundation and author of "at war the rise the internet military conflict" when the government admits its using drones and don't know for certain who's on the other end. we know we're using them without a sufficient amount of sir couple inspection. >> this is something that the

administration has not really had to contend with publicly, the signature strikes which most people are becoming more familiar with now. many of the strikes the cia conducts are targeted at people they don't know precisely who they are they just fit a pattern makes them seem like al qaeda members or senior leaders. i'm not at all confident that's going to answer the questions asked in these reviews that are going on right now. these might be reviews about protocols and communications but fund amountly i'm not asking them change the nature of the program to suspend signature strikes in the future. >> you write about this in your new article, the cia was tracking someone they thought was important, a senior al qaeda member at the compound. but precisely who he was, the cia says it didn't know. that may be and yet the who would seem to be very distinct from the problem in this

instance, which was the where, even if they knew exactly who they were going after, there isn't any indication that intelligence would know that these hostages were deliberately secretly held at these facilities, this compound right? >> that's right. that's probably one of the most important questions this review is going to have to answer. why is it that the cia did not know these two men, italian and american hostage were being held in this facility when by the administration's own admission, it had hundreds of hours of footage before the site and near real time around the clock surveillance. why is it they only thought there were four al qaeda terrorists at the site and not the two men inside? that's a huge question and points to a real gap in the collection the cia has been conducting when it comes to finding and locating hostages but keeping track of where they might be held by terrorists. >> the cia and pentagon in theory operate under the same

intel, but president obama trialed to move the drone program from the cia to the department of defense. does this january drone mistake, does that only add more fuel to the goal? if that were to happen what difference would that make? >> it might. the cia has been pretty good about resisting that transition and hanging onto the authorities that it has to operate the drones. we should remember that president obama has embraced this program as a central pillar of his counterterrorism operations but whether they are being flown by the cia or flown by the military you still face the same issues of how do you know for sure who you are aiming at. do you know the identities of people you're targeting and what did the intelligence tell you? those problems are true with regardless of whether it's a guy in a uniform or cia officer? >> right, that's the piece. how can you be sure and how sure do you need to be before you go in? the president has said that the bar is near certainty that there won't be civilian casualties and

obviously we're looking to see what we can do to make sure something like this never happens again. you've been writing about other hostages out there at risk including an american mom and her baby it's hard to know how many civilian casualties we've had from drone strikes, one zpert quoted in the "new york times," averaged the number of studies and said one reasonable estimate is 522 strikes have killed close to 4,000 people and 476 of them have been civilians. that seems a long way from near certainty but the question is is there any way we could reform this program to have near certainty that there wouldn't be civilian collateral damage? >> i think you would have to severely restrict how the cia reconducts it. if that is accurate gives a sense of how collateral damage is more common than the idea of near certainty might actually

suggest. there's a question also of who is a civilian and who is not. there is debate whether people not targeted perhaps still associated with the target. regardless, this is a very messy business, and i think the idea of near certainty is a prepost rouse notion. we thought we had near certainty there weren't innocent hostages in the building and there were. if you can put restrictions tighter around the targeting that you had to have zero people standing by except the individual target then you would have to suspend the program. it would be impossible to target senior al qaeda leaders without any risk of hitting people around them who were not also precisely targeted. >> shane harris thanks for your time today. >> an update on breaking news out of new york city it's all clear after the bomb squad searched the statue of liberty out of an abundance of caution. hundreds of tourists were evacuated offer the island after a bomb threat was received and

police dog detected something of possible concern in the locker area where visitors leave items before entering statue. after further investigation, nothing suspicious was found and things are slowly returning to normal. ahead this hour growing pressure on hillary clinton and today her campaign is firing back. also coming up more than 40 million americans are bracing for severe weather this weekend. hard at work figuring out to tell us what's going on. why are we here in washington? well because it's time for nerd prom. guest of honor, of course ari melber. >> you shouldn't have. we all enter this world with a shout and we see no reason to stop. so cvs health is creating industry-leading programs and tools that help people stay on medicines as their doctors prescribed. it could help save tens of thousands of lives every year. and that w ould be something worth shouting about.

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benghazi private e-mail servers, scandals seem to keep piling up for hillary clinton and we're 564 days away from the election. >> that's all? >> yeah the latest allegations are that decisions made when he was secretary of state may have been influenced by donations made to her family's foundation. the clinton team is fighting back claiming that there is quote no shred of evidence of any quid pro quo when she was secretary of state and isn't seem to be any smoking gun so far. what seems crystal clear as chuck todd pointed out, the clintons actions were politically dumb. >> how many more warnings did the clintons need to have and yet they ended up doing these things? look i hear what david is saying and there's clearly -- he's right, there's not proof,

it's sort of circumstantial scandal. the question i have is that's it politically though just dumb and inept. what is he doing hanging out with the president of kazakhstan. i understand he may rationize it, we're going to use this money for good i don't care. the but boy, the appearance of it is terrible. >> mrs. clinton has agreed to testify before republican congressman tray gowdy's house committee about her private e-mail server but even that is enough enough. not enough. he wants her to testify twice, once on the e-mails and once on benghazi. dana milbank, political columnist

not only about the clintons and go there and see what they are doing, all of these non-profits from all over the world, that money being locked in with speeches and greed, a lot of that money goes out to deal with the world's problems and a lot of events the bulk of the summit, people gathering and making forward looking commitments around the world,

it's hard to look as the only political g1u and on the other hand we have groups like common cause not the right wing echo chamber. put a statement out from them today, saying there's potential!u conflicts of interest here. what do you make of that conflict i'm(putting forward. >> i'm not sure it's a tie breaker there. i'm sure that's the sort of rational going through bill clinton's head while doing this saying i am doing this for a good purpose. i have to think at least now in retrospect, why didn't we say as of the time she became secretary of state we're not going to accept foreign contributions, it may have limited the growthçó of the clinton global initiative but they wouldn't be in this mess that they are in right now. so you know i think it can be defended but when you have to go through such great lengths to defend it it's a tricky xdissue. when you add in the questions are they getting personally enriched by the people making

contributions to the foundation it has a whole other layer and can be explained, just clinton supporters will have a real headache trying to explain it. >> dana since ari covered every possible issue relating toçó hillary, i guess of the other side marco rubio. >> that must be hard to pick another topic. >> at this point it's completely insignificant that he has a margin of error lead over jeb bush. but what is significant, he's making serious headway in the race for big donor support. jeb hoped to raise $100 million in the first quarter and end this whole thing. that is not going to happen is it? >> no tour'e unfortunately for marco rubio speaking too soon there's three dozen republican candidates and you each getxd your week. the thing that happened with jeb, he didn't lockdown the money and in part this is republicans are being hoisted

because of citizens united and massive flow of darkçó money into politics it's not just -- one guy can't lockup the money atl anymore, there's plenty to go around to keep all in the race for a long period of time. this is sort of a byproduct of having touch money in the political system no longer went about the field at all. >> i would ask you another question, but tour'e took the last topic i could think about. >> we have to close up tp because tour'e said we're out of time. >> dana thank you so çómuch. coming up, holding down the fort back in new york andñr trapping very rough weather for the weekend. your storm cycle forecast is next. building aircraft, the likes of which the world has never seen. this is what we do.

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welcome back everyone tracking severe weather across the south, especially texas on this friday afvjx9==99ñ

two tornado watch boxes in effect through the afternoon and evening, one including the city of dallas watching storms rolling throughout over the nextjf few hours. tomorrow for saturday. the severe threat shifts east. atlanta, pa duke ka and knoxville, you can see the southeast you'll be the focus of the severe weather threat for saturday especially in the afternoon. otherwise we're dealing with chilly weather here in the northeast, in fact it's 50 degrees right now in new york city, it's been very cold and blustery. we are going to warm things up tomorrow. you can see this is your saturday forecast back to the 60s, a decent day in the northeast, lots of sunshine and more storms across the southeast. 90 in san antonio andw3 los angeles looking good 68 degrees and sunny. for sunday a couple more scattered storms possible across the east but= 77 in los angeles and here in the northeast, holding on to 60s, which is a good thing. today is so chilly we're going to gradually warm up over next few days and i think we stay dry

throughout the entire weekend through dó5sñ up toçr=y> boston. enjoy that weekend and make time outside. back to you in d.c. >> it is chilly but it is beautiful and sunny here. thank you so much for that. we turn back now to the growing drone debate but not necessarily in a way we've been discussing in the past day or so in regards to the tragedy overseas when a man crashed a drone on the white house lawn in january it sparked grave security concerns and the government is trying to create new rules to catch up ever q since. a new article entitled drone on articles thehcórden is hindering theñi commercial use of drone and costing the economy billions of dollars. gretchen west is a contributor to foreign affairs, thanks for being with us. >> thank you for having me. >> when people think of drones, they thing of ones used by the military, it could actually benefit our economy, how are those being used?

>>óv#ç so who are the companies and corporations who are the leaders in private drone technology? obviously we've all see the amazon drones on every network but what other companies besides them are making strides? >> well the united states two of the leader manufactures or cgi, chinese owned company and in europe and france they are all making drones to be used both for consumer uses but commercial use as well. >> so gretchen you are arguing that the faa needs to loosen up

restrictions and regulations so this commercial application of drones can really flourish and benefit our economy which you made a strong argument but aren't there security concerns here? abby was talking about the drone thatñr crashed in the white house lawn and a man fly basically a flying bicycle on the lawn. aren't there legitimate concerns here we need to be worried about? >> i think so but there's technology being developed that can make them fly safer. for example, most "át manufacturers and software companies such as drone deploy are creating technologies that can do geo sense and keep drones in -- come out of restricted air space but in a restricted pre-planned route. there are technologies that are being developed that can do that. the faa has not been relying on technology advances to enable the regulations in the right way, which is unfortunate, but i

do believe there's technology that exists that can actually help mitigate those security risks. >> well, you are saying they are not doing it the right way. what do you mean? >> the faa has been fairly slow to respond to this growing industry and trying to regulate it over the last decade. they've recently come out with proposed rules which are very much in favor of commercial and consumer use, not requiring a commercial or pilot's licensor air worthiness certification on aircraft. they are limiting how the systems can be used. they cannot be flown beyond theñi visual line of flight of the operator operatingt( the drone and also one drone can beñr operated per person. so there's a lot of technology that exists that can make drones do those things in a very safe manner but the ñifaa is not looking at those technologies to be the solution providers. >> very interesting stuff, gretchen west thank you so much for being with us. >> thank you very much. >> it's friday it'ád been a long week and frankly we are ready to take a breather.

the rest of the show will be focused on the lighter side. we have a behind the scenes look at the white house correspondents dinner. why do you think we're here? and we'll talk to cecily strong everyone will want to talk to her, including myself at this party. that's next. jack's heart attack didn't come with a warning. today, his doctor has him on a bayer aspirin regimen to help reduce the risk of another one. if you've had a heart attack be sure to talk to your doctor before your begin an aspirin regimen. people ship all kinds of things. but what if that thing is a few hundred thousand doses of flu vaccine.

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the white house correspondents dinner is tomorrow night an event that's special because of the comedy no matter how easy good comics make it look there's no challenge in entertainment like doing stand-up comedy. you're up there all alone with just a mike tasked with making people laugh really hard every five to ten seconds. if you don't do that you bomb. which is one of the most amazingly excruciating experiences in the world. >> yep, i'm deeply impressed by anyone who masters the art of

comedy. a new documentdy misery loves comedy, why anyone would get up on stage all alone and attempt to do jokes. >> the adrenalin and blood shoots through your head in a way that i think is identical to crystal meth. i would do gigs and do a shot at 12:30 and at 4:00 in the morning i would still can't figure out why i'm not asleep because just shot -- the adrenalin shoots through you. >> gives you some idea misery loves comedy is in theaters and directed by a man who started doing comedy at age 10 and been in the usual suspects casino the great movie buffalo 66 and santa claus 3 -- >> santa claus 3. >> please put your hands together and give a warm cycle welcome to mr. kevin poll lack.

>> please explain to us you do it yourself why would anyone get up in front of strangers who had a drink or two with just a mike and try to tell jokes? >> it's a legitimate question that will remain curious to most people at large. american's number one fear above death is public speaking. who would choose to do that knowing things could go horribly wrong at any second? as it turns out, children suffer from hey look at me disease because they are children and need attention. turns out adults need attention to otherwise facebook wouldn't be a multibillion dollar company. >> i don't know what you're talking about. >> why are there five cameras working right now? so who chooses hey look at me as a career? that's the largest question beyond do you have to be miserable to be funny which is the original these sis from my film. honestly who needs to be on that stage as vulnerable as any human

can be and waiting moment by moment for acceptance? >> kevin, first of all, santa claus 3, that is really one of my all time -- love you're here and did that film. but you talk about being an adult on three doing comedy. you started this at a young age, 10 years old. what was that like at 10 and what types of jokes are you telling at 10 years old? >> i was lip syncing a album and my mom caught me one day standing in front of the stereo high fi a 7-foot wide piece of furniture, compare that to the nano and i didn't even know i was doing something called lip snycing and i was playing, you're doing that at the zuckers for passover. my career was born. >> a star was born.

kevin, ari often coaches me on importance of silence. and you talk about in this documentary how silence is real important for comedy. >> he really finally discovered the greatness of comedy for him was in silence. it means you created a moment where you specifically want the audience to be silent which means they are listening before you deliver the next punch line as it were. but really it speaks more volumes to the control on stage as a performer. if you're performing an hour you're taking that audience for a ride of your choosing from beginning to end. you control the highs and ends and ebbs and flow and laughter. you're the writer editor performer, to have that kind of control as one person for an hour, well it's difficult to have that kind of control in one

minute in life so that's the drug, one of the things that jimmy fallon and others speak about the film as well. an actual endore fin is released similar to a runner's high. >> silence is powerful. >> yes, it is. >> i'm trying to create some for you, it's very difficult. it's very very difficult to be on your show i'm very proud to be here and say nothing. i'm not sure that's why i was invited invited. >> to me it feels good. >> let's take a moment. >> it's feeling aukward -- >> why don't i teach you all how to do an impersonation of jason stephane -- now the control room has told me it's going on long enough. >> okay, go do it. >> six words faster than any human being in a planet.

if you say them in a row, do you know what i mean? which he says is do you know what i mean? six worlds in two syllables. >> but you are an incredible mimic and what you do with chris trofr walken is extraordinary. i want to ask you a question about the film and respond in your christopher walken thing. people talk about bombing the worst experience but you have to get used to it to be a good comic. what would christopher walken say about bombing? >> sometimes you're out there on your own as it were and you know it's good. you know it's funny. there's something there for everyone if you will. but occasionally the audience will literally vote you off the island. they will simply as a mass disagree with the premise you've

put forth. >> wow. >> that's amazing. [ laughter ] >> take a listen to one thing from your film where you talk to judd who was so interested that he talked to so many comedians. we'll play a little bit of that. >> i would say to seinfeld how do you write a joke and force him to walk me through it or how do you write a movie? and those interviews -- changed my life because they really told me. it was my college. my college junior year of high school. >> how did that type of study affect him and how did he get those interviews? >> well he explains it in the film actually, he was a kid that would get word at comedy clubs to comedians that he was a local radio station and wanted to do an interview and show up at his house and realizing they were duped by the 16 yltd and since

they were already there talked to him anyway. >> it's a fantastic film thank you so much for being on the show. >> my pleasure thanks for the opportunity and support. >> all right, up next cecily strong and ron nan farrow and ari melber. i thought this was supposed to be fun? american express for travel and entertainment worldwide. just show them this - the american express card. don't leave home without it! and someday, i may even use it on the moon. it's a marvelous thing! oh! haha! so you can replace plane tickets, traveler's cheques, a lost card. really? that worked?

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it's friday and the countdown has begun at the white house for what is usually one of the president's most discussed speeches, his stand-up routine at the white house correspondents dinner tomorrow night. as the cycle gears up for the big weekend, wonder why we're all here? we talked to darrel hammond and white house speechwriters and chris matthews about the role of

comedy in politics. take a look. >> this weekend political and media lead ares gather at the white house correspondents dinner. and everyone is eager to see who will get the last laugh. >> most of you covered me. all of you voted for me. >> members of the white house correspondents association, distinguished guests ladies and gentlemen, here i am. >> it's the first time you see the big shots together and it's really cool. >> the sprawling room features one of the toughest crowds most comedians will ever face. >> movers and shakers of the world and it's the hardest room ever. they are kind of looking at each you're not laughing at that, are you trump? the most important part if the team doesn't laugh, the subjects won't laugh. >> darrel hammond, famous for his impressions of al gore and

bill clinton headlined the dinner in 2001. >> i can't describe like tara, it's not just scared i did graduate with a 2.1 average and don't feel that remarkable. >> mrs. clinton has -- i don't know over the last i guess eight years or so sometimes -- like when she smiles her mouth will and eyes won't. and it gives you the distinct impression that over the last eight years, laughter and rage have become indistinguishable. >> sometimes the political mood of the country is best captured by a tough joke. former speechwriter knows something about that. >> i jokingly call writing these speeches constructive outlets for my political road rage. >> i believe the government that governs best is the government that governs least, but these standards, we have set up a fabulous government in iraq. >> the vice president is already

moving out of his residence, it takes longer than you think to pack up an entire dung on. >> mr. president, look at your hair if the hair gets whiter the tea party is going to endorse it. >> while comedians can get away blasting any target presidents must walk a finer line or at least try. >> there are jokes that are so funny and so good but the reward of a laugh in the room isn't worth the risk of creating a news story or offending someone. there have been examples at the white house correspondents dinner where both president obama and george w. bush got heat for going over the line. >> those weapons of mass destruction got to be somewhere. >> that's why there's sort of a difference between funny and washington funny. >> and being funny isn't easy for every president says former carter speechwriter chris matthews. >> you get back big xs later in the drafts where i thought it was a real hoot and he didn't

think it was funny. >> john faf ro was the chief speech writer for five years. >> he always insists on a lot of self-dep pri indicating humor. the president's sense of humor is very much based on looking at the absurdity of politics and making fun of it. >> tonight i want to speak from the heart, i'm going to speak off the cuff. >> and since he's part of that process, he wants to make sure he makes fun of himself as well. >> it's a rare opportunity for presidents to deploy their own zingers. >> why don't you get a drink with mitch mcconnell they ask? really? why don't you get a drink with mitch mcconnell. >> one goal is to really stick a dagger in an opponent in a way that will be mean spirited if it weren't done with a laugh.

one of my favorites when he announced he had uncovered his live birth video and the opening scene from the lion king started playing king" started playing after donald trump decided to send a crack team of investigators to find his birth certificate in hawaii. >> though favreau says the white house priority is in lapse over scoring points. >> it's not which joke will help him push an issue forward, it's which joke is funniest. >> mr. president have a seat. >> and when politics and comedy collide, you never know what will happen. >> i was in the oval office dressed up like clinton. fake nose the whole thing, wearing exactly what he was wearing that night. and he came up to me and i was so scared i thought look he knows i'm scared. i said mr. president, i'm not even going to try to act like i don't feel stupid. and he leans in to me and says, i think you look terrific.

>> and the lady on the hot seat the emcee for tomorrow night is "snl's" cecily strong. i bet she's nervous tonight. our man ronan farrow has cecily's take on standing up in front of the president and folks like us. she knows it's one tough gig and she's aware of that. >> it is one of the toughest gigs in comedy hosting the annual white house correspondents association dinner. it's following the president of the united states. it also means staring down a washington political elite not always eager to make fun of itself. this year "saturday night live's" cecily strong takes that podium. i sat down with her as she prepared in washington and she told me she's all too aware of the challenges. >> i've heard all of these things, which made it so much more appealing. and you have to follow the funniest president. so it's -- i guess those are things i have to not think about. >> since the 1940s, the white house correspondents dinner has featured hosts from bob hope to

stephen colbert. >> he believes the same thing wednesday that he believed on monday. no matter what happened tuesday. >> i remember when that was live and just being blown away and just thinking he's so amazing, and so brave. look what comedy can do. >> events can change. this man's beliefs never will. >> cecily strong will be only the fourth female comedienne to step behind that podium. >> it doesn't feel like a huge deal to me. it's i think a really nice testament to where everything stands right now. i think a lot of it has to do with tina and amy being out there so much. it's very accepted. it's nice that it doesn't feel like a big heavy thing for me. >> and we'll see if you feel that way after everyone askingout about your dress and not about your performance. >> well, then i'll feel pretty. >> you've got one of the most powerful audiences in the room. the leader of the free world right there. >> i'm going to ask for a lot of favors. >> ask for favors right. >> i want an ambassadorship.

>> i think that could happen. belgium, here you come. >> oh, yes, waffles. >> waffle diplomacy, very important. >> and it's like that's what you want to do. point out the stupid things. there's a lot of stupid going on. >> and so often in politics, not a lot of funny. so you've said the president has some of the best comic timing of any president. >> he does. he's cool, too. that moment, the state of the union when he said, i should know, i won two of them. >> i have no more campaigns to run. my only agenda -- [ laughter ] i know because i won both of them. >> and it was an ad lib, apparently. >> that's what i mean. that's what you think to say afterwards. usually in the moment, you're like -- it's never cool. i'm never that cool. afterwards you're like ah i should have said that. >> and he's cool as a cucumber.

so when we talk about funny presidents, let's talk about some of the potential next presidents. >> oh sure. >> give me your thoughts on ted cruz. very funny president? or unfunny president. >> unfunny. >> rand paul? >> that would be funny. that's a funny president. he's got that goofy little silly dad, who's so endearing. >> marco rubio. funny president? >> oh no. not yet. but he could surprise me. >> okay. hillary clinton. would she make a funny president? >> i don't know that she can be. >> does she have it in her? >> she wants to. she'll try hard. >> she'll rock the mom jokes. >> she's going to keep trying. one of these days one of them's going to land. >> i'll drink to that. cheers. >> cecily strong talking about her big performance tomorrow at the white house correspondents

dinner. one of the best things i learned from darrell hammond is he said he would study bill clinton hours at a time. one of the things he learned is most people have five or six hand motions. bill clinton has 37. it just gives you an insight into how deeply and seriously they take this. this is their life's work. >> i can't imagine, to be that comedian in front of that room is one thing. but then to be impersonating the president. is this the most nervous you've ever been? he said hands down the most nervous. and how can you not be? >> i'm looking forward to cecily strong. she's going to be very awesome. >> absolutely. i'm interested that she doesn't think marco rubio would be funny. that water moment was comedic gold. >> you never know. anything can happen. we've got much more coverage for you this weekend. tomorrow morning on the "today" show ari and i will bring you more of our conversation with darrell hammond and presidential speech writer jon favreau, including how they actually come up with the jokes. that will be really interesting.

tomorrow night, krystal ball leading up to the main event. the correspondents' dinner starts at 9:00. we'll bring you all the highlights here on "the cycle" on monday. "now with alex wagner" starts right after the break. your pet... could you love him any more? probably not.

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eric holder has left the building. the republican field of dreams converges on iowa. and any minute now, baltimore police are expected to give an update on tear probe into the death of freddie gray. but first, investigations are under way into the drone strike that killed at least three americans including one hostage. it's friday april 24th and this is "now." >> the u.s. doesn't always know who it's killing. >> the president and his administration are promising to peel back the layers of its controversial drone program. >> the hope is there may be some improvements to the policies and protocols. >> this is war at its toughest. >> you can't continue to operate and shoot at targets you think might be right. >> any time you attack from the air, there's a very good possibility of s