. >> not to disagree with my friend david brooks, the hamiltonian who believes in centralized power, one of the few conservative powers -- >> and your friend thomas jefferson -- >> who believed in democracy and the virtue of the people. so nothing personal in this at all. i think it's just very, very hard to exercise and i agree with tom to present a coherent narrative in a culture where every is their own dun did, their own anchorman, their own narrator. >> rose: david brooks or tom friedman, in washington, back to the idea of presidential leadership. remember -- i remember when jimmy carter and there was all this conversation about one man couldn't hold the job and along came ronald reagan and said, yes, in fact, he can hold this job and provide a vision aren't these qualities that are still viable for presidential leadership. >> i guess i would say the sign of a failing president is someone who talks about the limitationlimitation of the powe office. (laughter). >> rose: or david suggests it's a marketing problem and not a content problem. go ahead. >> i woulday it's not knowing h

and cocoauthor of "that used to be us, how america fell behind in the world it e invented" and david brooks of the "new york times," he is the author of "the social animal." joining me in new york, tom brokaw, a special correspondent for nbc news and the author of "the time of our lives" a conversation about america. and jon meacham, the executive editor of random house and the author of the forthcoming book "thomas jefferson, the art of power." finally joining us, amy gutman, president of the university of pennsylvania and chair of the president's commission on bioethics and the coauthor of "the spirit of compromise" why governing demands it and campaigning undermines it. i'm pleased to have each of them here for this conversation. we obviously don't know who the new president is and we come forward with the premise that whoever it is, these are the issues and the choices and the challenges that face him. i'll start with you. what is it this new president has to understand about america at this moment? >> well, i think this new president is going to have to govern and governing in a polari

joining me are tom brocaw, ally gutmann, david brooks and jon meacham. >> they have to taker it out of column a and say some seizure are right and some of the issues on education and inequity are right and i'm going to take it out of both sides and that will just confuse everybody. but more people in the country between the tweeting and blogging would say interesting. >> rose: america and its ent re, the americame mwhno mont when we continue. re captioning sponsored by rose communications >> right here at home. >> that future is out there waiting for us. >> rose: a politician thinks of the next election, a statesman of the next gentlemen of the jury race said the theologian james clerk and you can't govern in poetry or pros. we want to raise this question. where is america 2012, 236 years after its birth and where is it going, the challenge of the next administration to both immediate and deep. no great country sustained its position without a strong economic foundation. the new president and new congress must deal with a fiscal cliff. partisan grid lock has present us from making hard

david brooks in his column writes about the fiscal cliff which happens at the end of this year, big tax increases and also cuts. here's what he writes.er if obama wins, he'll probably romney is more flexible than obama. he has more influence in washington. he is more likely to get big stuff done. savannah, this is a key question. >> it is. and the president has banked on the fact that the election will solve these issues, litigate the issues of whether the bush tax i breaks should be rolled back for the wealthiest of americans. when he caved on that, he said he will answer this two years later with the election. he is also banking on the fact that the republicans will want to work with him after the election. especially when you look at the makeup of congress not likely to change. we'll have the same set of circumstances potentially if obama wins, and yet he is promising that the fever will break post-election. he's got a lot riding on it. >> i think it's going to be a status quo election. and i think if romney wins, for example, he still is looking at a house of representatives that ha

david brooks of "the new york times." msnbc's reverend al sharpton. former ceo of hewlett-packard carly fiorina >> historian and film maker ken burns. and nbc chief foreign affairs correspondent andrea mitchell. and we'll here from representative gregory meeks this morning as we check in on some of the hardest-hit victims of hurricane sandy and see how they offered thanks this weekend while surrounded by destruction. >>> from nbc news in washington, the world's longest-running television program, this is "meet the press." with david gregory. >>> president obama doing his part for the economy over the weekend out holiday shopping as part of small business saturday, picking up several children's book at an independent bookstore iypÑarlington. >>> meanwhile, uncertainty in the middle east. more clashes in egypt over the weekend as police use tear gas this morning to disburse protesters in cairo. i want to start there. we have "new york times" columnist david brooks and our own andrea mitchell. andrea, this is because president morsi has seized power, a d

monday, tuesday, as long as it takes until we know what the results is. >> woodruff: mark shield, david brooks. and mark and david keep up the and mark and david keep up the talk on the "doubleheader," recorded in our newsroom. that will be posted at the top of the rundown later tonight. >> brown: finally tonight, a preview of a pbs election special: an in-depth look at the candidates and their plans to address the nation's most critical issues. "what's at stake" was produced by "need to know," with contributions from its own correspondents, as well as "frontline," "washington week," and the newshour. one segment is a report i did on subjects that have not been part of the conversation this election year. here's an excerpt about gun violence, beginning with a largely ignored fact of life in 2012, a series of mass shootings. >> two kills and nine wounded outside the empire state building, seven killed at a university in oakland, california, seven dead at a sikh temple in oak creek, wisconsin. 12 killed and dozens more wound at a move yee these per in aurora, colorado. and then there was this. >

and those who are comforted like david brooks and some people have talked about how they're comfortedy the fact he's a flip-flopper and he would be more likely to work through some bipartisan reform. on the other hand, he's going to be dealing with a severely conservative house republican conference, and they're not going to give an inch on him. i'm not sure how we expect him to get anything done when he's going to be dealing with the same intransigent group we've been looking at. >> but to that point, julian, when david brooks and t"the times" says romney will work with this congress doesn't that mean romney will fall down and allow people to drive through the brutal and callous legislation they would seek? >> david brooks is probably my favorite columnist after michelle cottle that is, but this kind -- >> i share that view. >> this kind of endorsement from him is kind of like a drunken toast from a best man. it's essentially saying romney is a good candidate because he's about as hollow as the tin man and he will fold depending what the political winds are which is hardly a very str

which may be a message. >> i will keep watching that one and everything else. >> mark shield, david brooks, thanks as always. and if you want even more, mark and david keep up the talk on the "doubleheader" recorded in our newsroom. that will be posted at the top of the "rundown" later tonight. >> warner: we'll be back shortly with a look at efforts to pinpoint the age of the grand canyon. but first, this is pledge week on pbs. this break allows your public television station to ask for your support. and that support helps keep programs like ours on the air. >> brown: for those stations not taking a pledge break, we take an encore look at president abraham lincoln and his evolving legacy in politics and culture. earlier this year, hari sreenivasan toured the ford's theatre center for education and leadership in washington, d.c., with historian richard norton smith. >> sreenivasan: walking into the theater center is like taking a step back in time to the cobblestone streets of washington on april 16, 1855, the day after president abraham lincoln's death. newspaper headlines cover the walls

it is a little depatch-- detached and a little more aloof. >> woodruff: and david brooks and mark shields, an extraordinary week from the two of you. thank you. we'll see you next week. >> thank you. >> brown: mark and david keep up the talk on the "doubleheader" recorded in our newsroom. that will be posted at the top of the rundown later tonight. and again, the major developments of the day: president obama addressed the coming fiscal crisis for the first time since the election. he said again he won't accept a deal unless it includes higher taxes on the wealthy. retired general david petraeus signed as director of the cia after acknowledging he'd had an extra-marital affair. and the u.s. supreme court agreed to hear a challenge to a landmark civil rights law, the voting rights act of 1965. and we have some dramatic photos of refugees fleeing syria online. hari sreenivasan tells us more. >> sreenivasan: they are images of the thousands of people who have escaped to turkey. watch our slideshow of refugees and turkish forces patrolling the border on the rundown. we have a follow-up to mar

. >> brown: mark shields and david brooks analyze the weeks news. >> suarez: spencer michels has the story of a growing crackdown on dissidents and journalists in iran. >> brown: and we close with poet jennifer fitzgerald on hurricane sandy's destructive path through her home town of staten island. that's all ahead on tonight's newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. >> and by the bill and melinda gates foundation. dedicated to the idea that all people deserve the chance to live a healthy productive life. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> brown: demonstrations, clashes with the police, and tear gas in tahrir square-- familiar scenes in egypt nearly two years ago that led to the fall of longtime leader hosni mubark. but today, they were aimed at egypt's n

that's "new york times" columnist david brooks and "washington post columnist ruth marcus, filling in for mark shields. welcome to you both on this friday. so david, what dow make of this negativity and andy kohut is saying shows up in these post-election poll. >> he said 68% of the respondents thought the campaigns were more negative in the past which tells me 32% were wrong,. i think it was the worst campaign i ever covered. and i think romney was all over the place. obama ran a very negative campaign. the level of tolerated dishonesty was higher than any i ever covered. they used to start campaigns by giving big speeches on policies and people like ruth and i would chew over them. those speeches, i guess they desid they didn't need to give them because the policies weren't there the only ray of hope in the way the campaign was conducteds is the campaign especially the obama campaign is much better at door knocking, face-to-face, door front interviews. and i do think because of that and all the information that's given canvasers without say they do have a lot of actual conversations

. >> ifill: and back with us again, for analysis, are mark shields and david brooks. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: for the first time in four years, president obama did not have to worry about re-election today. still, there was little time to savor tuesday's victory, in the face of a potential fiscal crisis at the end of the year. "newshour" correspondent kwame holman begins our coverage on this day after the election of 2012. >> reporter: mr. obama departed his hometown of chicago this afternoon for washington, his home for another four years. waiting for him: a still- divided congress now facing a critical lame duck session. the president made it clear in his victory speech last night that he thinks

. >> david brooks, there's a larger strategic question. there's egypt, gaza, syria, iran. there's a president's second term that's got to be dominated by this region. >> i think so. it's the middle east, so there's good news and bad news. the good news is that the obama administration did an excellent job of supporting israel all through this. made israel feel moderate and the arabs feel realistic. the second piece of good news is that egypt, even under the muslim brotherhood, has an interest in having stability. that's very important. the bad news is the islamists are in control. in the palestinian areas with hamas and certainly in control in egypt. and there's going to be no peace as long as they are there in control, and u.s. policy has got to be a long, gradual process of trying to build up the non-islamists in the arab world, including in iran, across the region. >> that frames it. we'll hear more from you in the roundtable. >>> now let me turn to carl levin, chairman of course of the armed services committee in the senate. senator, to egypt. how concerned are you? is