and he said if you talked to the individual commanders, the ranger commander, charlie beckwith of delta force, the marine pilots that flew the helicopters, the c-130 pilots, anybody involved with it, each of them would say we can do our job. we are fully confident that we can succeed in our job. talking to this lieutenant general who was in daily contact with all five members of the joint chiefs and with the major general who was the overall mission commander, he said nobody had any confidence that it was going to succeed. it was so complex, so complicated that every minuscule part had to fall just right into place at each perfect time. and he said nobody at that level really had much confidence in it. i don't know whether they communicated that to the president. i know the president was under a great deal of dress -- of stress to do something. he had just lost the new york primary to teddy kennedy. he was up for re-election. so that's, that's that. yes, sir. >> [inaudible] >> wait for the microphone, please. >> [inaudible] >> anybody got a microphone handy? somebody got one in your poc

i want to start with the question for karen beckwith.i would like her to follow up on observations on how the trump administration selection and cabinet selection process compares to what you've seen historically as patterns in the united states and comparatively too other countries. >> thank you for that question. >> so, our new president has promised to be different in different indeed he is. at least in regard to cabinet appointments. one of the things that we note, if we think about these criteria for qualification for appointment to cabinet, experience for criteria, affiliation of criteria and representational criteria, it's very interesting to me that he is violating all three in terms of previous practice but let me start and i will be as quickly as i can. these are policy expertise and political experience. of his various nominees, he has to who have no policy or government expense whatsoever. there's every reason to believe that all of these nominees will be confirmed because the president has his own party in the senate and eve

i want to start with a question for karen beckwith and ask her to follow-up on her comments at the and of her presentation. tell us more about your observations of how the trump administration's selections and cabinet selection process compares to what you've seen historically as patterns in the united states and comparatively to other countries? >> well, thank you for that question. our new president has promised to be different. is, at leasteed he in regard to cabinet appointments. if we think about these criteria for qualifications for components to cabinet, that's appointments to cabinet, -- -- criteria for qualifications for appointments to cabinet, experiential criteria, affiliation or criteria and representational criteria, it's very interesting to me that he is violating all three in terms of previous practice. these are policy expertise and political experience of his various nominees he has to have no policy or government experience whatsoever, ben carson who will head housing and urban development. the president has his own party in the senate now and even without that it wo