david gergen, let me start with you. you wrote this dot-com op-ed that asked the question, headline, have they gone nuts in washington? were you surprised at all by this? i mean, what do you think appears goi's going on? >> very surprised. what we've seen in the past is we've often had contentious politics, deep philosophical differences between the parties. but at the 11th hour they've found a way to get somewhere close to the middle and signed a deal that got you partway there. this is one of the first times that i can remember when it's been utter failure. and occurring, sanjay, in the midst of an economic situation that's very fragile. as you mentioned, we have a real problem in europe right now. the euro could collapse over there. they're definitely heading towards some sort of recession that could rebound here. and that kind of volatility in the marketplace, damping consumer confidence, you could have a lot of things start to unwind here. people get hurt with loss of jobs. this is, to my way of thinking, a reckless

let's consider more on this breaking news with our political analyst david gergen. gloria borger still with us. and david walker, david gergen, as someone who has served four u.s. presidents and watchedle more. when you watch this process set up with such fanfare torborg get the united states debt limit raised over the summer time. the total collapse, the message that sends a washington gridlock and dysfunction, is there anyway out now or do we go through a presidential campaign? >> we're mostly going to go through a presidential campaign. i don't see anyway out in the next 12 months. david walker points out that there is a sequestration trigger that the president says he'll veto any attempt and get around it. i think most people will be so angry about this. it appear that washington has gone nuts. and the country is going to be angry. the markets are going to be volatile. this is going to strike most people as a reckless gamble with our economy. we don't know where the markets are going. especially in the context of europe also having serious political leadership pr

david gergen, i'll start on this end of the group.learn tonight? >> huntsman, best night. romney held his own but seemed to fade, didn't have as much air time, not as dominant. newt gingrich, wind at his back coming in, a big entourage following him hadn't he left. >> newt gingrich, less confrontational, more informational. so i thought he had a good night. jon huntsman, because he this is an ar where he understand the world, served under three president. herman cain faded from the landscape but we know who should be on the other end of the 3:00 a.m. phone call, it's barack obama. >> why did i know that was coming? >> i knew it was coming. the republicans rightly to your right in the conversation here, ari fleischer, final thought? >> he can be on the 3:00 a.m. phone call until january 19, 2013, then it's going to change on the line. another debate, another good night for newt. but the trend here those who have fallen behind are not coming back up. so the question is, when the music stops, who is going to be in the not romney chair? 7

david gergen, your quick, first impression on what we heard from these eight republican candidates tonight? >> i don't have any sound. i'm not hearing anything. >> david's having a bit of an audio problem. dana lash, as a conservative who watched the race, mitt romney at the top of the pack but a host of other conservatives come up what i call the anybody but romn romney candidate, former speaker newt gingrich came in, tied if not nationally ahead tonight, your first impression from what we learned from the eight republican candidates? >> i think there were a couple of really explosive parts of the debate for me. the first one was obviously iran. i thought that perry and gingrich led the way with strategy when it comes to iran. but the thing that sort of blew up in newt gingrich's face, i think, the discussion on immigration. he had a rick perry heartless moment with this. i think this is really going to impact him tomorrow. it's really going to impact him with grassroots conservatives. i can see both sides of the argument here. he was reaganesque, '84-'86, reagan signed a huge amnesty bil

david gergen joins us, senior political analyst here. glo gloria borger is our chief political analyst. they'll be talking about this in cuts, for defense, it's going to be a big issue. it's not an easy issue. >> no oorkts not an easy issue, particularly for republicans. because i think what we're going to see happen is the hawks, like john mccain, are going to come into a big fight with the anti-tax republicans. anti-tax because the money has to come from somewhere. if you are going to roll back these defense cuts, where are you going to -- you know, where are you going to find the money to offset it? well. >>> republicans just might say, you ought to look at the extension of the bush tax cuts for the wealthy. we can't afford to do that anymore. so i think this is going to be a debate within the republican party. >> it's not just the republicans. the president and the democrats have some issues here, too. and the president just went to the pacific. he just talked about projecting more military power into the pacific. we're not going to

senior political analyst david gergen and david fromme. good to have you with us. david, it is southwesting how a big decision like this gets put off until after the election. >> there may be reasons of substance that they need further study, but no one in washington believes that. it looks purely political. the president had to choose between the environmental block. they didn't really want this. he wants the votes and labor unions who want the jobs and he got caught in the middle. let me add another element. it is more than american politics. i have been up in canada the last six or eight weeks a couple of times. this is important to canadian relations and they are saying we thought you were going to do. this we invested and made a lot of reliance on doing this and by you putting it off, let's make it clear to americans, we have seen you as our partner for oil an gas. we intended to sell your oil and gas. if you are going to screw around with this, we have an alternative, we will sell it to china. >> and they sure can do it. ship right in to vancouver and take it

senior political analyst david gergen and david fromme. good to have you with us. david, it is southwesting how a big decision like this gets put off until after the election. >> there may be reasons of substance that they need further study, but no one in washington believes that. it looks purely political. the president had to choose between the environmental block. they didn't really want this. he wants the votes and labor unions who want the jobs and he got caught in the middle. let me add another element. it is more than american politics. i have been up in canada the last six or eight weeks a couple of times. this is important to canadian relations and they are saying we thought you were going to do. this we invested and made a lot of reliance on doing this and by you putting it off, let's make it clear to americans, we have seen you as our partner for oil an gas. we intended to sell your oil and gas. if you are going to screw around with this, we have an alternative, we will sell it to china. >> and they sure can do it. ship right in to vancouver and take it

bennett, this is david gergen. "the washington post" and "the new york times," they say they that she wants an opportunity to have her side told and you just said she's still mulling and not sure what she is mulling. >> naturally, she's been very upset about this since the story broke last sunday because mr. cain has been giving the impression she came out and made false allegations. that's certainly not true and she's still deciding, once we hear from the restaurant association, what she'll do if they'll waive the confidentiality. until they do that, she's not going to speak out. >> was she released? did she leave the national restaurant association because she made the allegations? was the separation based on this or did they accuse her or say she was not a good employee for other grounds? what was the basis on which she left? >> to the best of my recollection, there were no complaints about her performance. she was ready to move on to another position in light of the way she had been treated by mr. cain, with th

paul begala joins us, political contributor here, senior political analyst david gergen and politicallyst david fromme. the decision like this gets put off till after the election. >> there may be reasons substance, like they need further study, but nobody in washington believes this. it looks political. the president had to choose between the environmental bloc who didn't want this, he wants their votes, and labor unions, you know, who want the jobs. it's more than just american politics. i've been up there in canada a couple of times in the last 6 or 8 weeks. this is really important to u.s./canadian relations. what they're telling me there, business community's saying we thought you were going to do this. we started investing. we made reliance on you doing this. by you putting it off, let's just make clear to you as americans, we've always seen you as our partner for oil and gas. we intended to sell you our oil and gas. if you're going to screw around with us, we've got an alternati alternative, we're going to sell it to china. >> they sure can do that, right? ship right into vanco

david gergen joins us. jamal, let me start with you and ask you about that precipitous drop among white blue collar democrats. how -- why do you think that has happened so dramatically and so quickly among a group of voters he traditionally has owned? >> well, it's a problem, let's start there. this is not good news for the president. but it is also -- we have to distinguish between white blue collared democrats and white plu collar independents and republicans. most democratic -- white democratic swing voters, those reagan democrats everyone talks about, they've left the democratic party. this was true in the primaries in 2008. they typically end up voting for the democratic nominee or else they probably would've already left. they're satisfied, the president's got to try to energize them for the election. that's different than the population of the general election blue collar voter. >> they may be satisfied with him, but i mean, is there any alternative out there? if you look at the republican side where

let's go to david gergen. senior political analyst here at cnn and john avlon, contributor and columnist for "newsweek" and "the daily beast." thanks to both of you. you were here on friday. we were all angry and upset and hopeful that thereby a breakthrough. but there wasn't. >> no. this is a profile in cower did he say, this is a new low for this government and people should be furious. they put party over country and now we're going to have a lot of trouble ahead. they had the power to do something about it. the fact that they put out a statement saying they still hope we can deal with our fiscal crisis and shouldn't pass this to the next generation, that's just incredibly insincere, pathetic and folks should be furious and mad as hell. all that rhetoric about deficit and debt, they put tax cut theology over dealing with that. i'm just furious. >> david gergen, i'm furious too. in the deafening silence that was today and max baucus said maybe there's a last minute idea and all we got was a statement. they d

what do you think, david gergen? >> a couple of things.l, what we're seeing is when you're a candidate who is down fifth, sixth or seventh, people don't pay a lot of attention to you. when you come up and you're a challenger as he is now, you get this kind of scrutiny. this is only the beginning of the scrutiny. there will be a lot about his personal life before it's over. on the facts as we know them about this situation, i happen to agree that it does not seem to me he's done anything that is improper, much less illegal. he was hired -- i think it's objection able that these government agencies were paying people so much. he was one of many people. i think congress is going to try to put a stop to that. i think his only danger is if he mischaracterizes what he did or misleading people and he's found out. as to taking that much money over a long period of time, it doesn't rise to the level of something that usually causes a bunch of political trouble. >> it is amazing how we're the only country with a fannie and freddie and our homeowner

what do you think, david gergen? >> a couple of things.all, what we're seeing is when you're a candidate who is down fifth, sixth or seventh, people don't pay a lot of attention to you. when you come up and you're a challenger as he is now, you get this kind of scrutiny. this is only the beginning of the scrutiny. there will be a lot about his personal life before it's over. on the facts as we know them about this situation, i happen to agree that it does not seem to me he's done anything that is improper, much less illegal. he was hired -- i think it's objection able that these government agencies were paying people so much. he was one of many people. i think congress is going to try to put a stop to that. i think his only danger is if he mischaracterizes what he did or misleading people and he's found out. as to taking that much money over a long period of time, it doesn't rise to the level of something that usually causes a bunch of political trouble. >> it is amazing how we're the only country with a fannie and freddie and our homeowne

david gergen, cnn contributor. erik erickson and sherry jacobs, columnist for "the hill." david, on immigration, if you listen to speaker gingrich's answer there, he's taking a gamble. he's looking past the primary and past tea party voters, and we expect mitt romney to focus on the general election and barack obama, a risk for speaker gingrich, no? >> certainly sounded like it. and erik will have a much better sense of how much damage he may have done for himself by going soft, so to speak, on immigration. how much damage he may have done among conservatives, the conservative base, especially in places like iowa. but i think as a general proposition, john, that newt gingrich is trying to reintroduce himself to the american people. he's been out of the limelight for a long time. he was seen as a bomb thrower in his earlier days. effective, yes, but a bomb thrower. and i think he's trying to introduce himself as a person who has grown, become more mature. and perhaps more empathic. with those who have had problems in the past. after all, this is a man asking voters to forgiv

let's go to david gergen. senior political analyst here at cnn and john avlon, contributor and columnist for "newsweek" and "the daily beast." thanks to both of you. you were here on friday. we were all angry and upset and hopeful that thereby a breakthrough. but there wasn't. >> no. this is a profile in cower did he say, this is a new low for this government and people should be furious. they put party over country and now we're going to have a lot of trouble ahead. they had the power to do something about it. the fact that they put out a statement saying they still hope we can deal with our fiscal crisis and shouldn't pass this to the next generation, that's just incredibly insincere, pathetic and folks should be furious and mad as hell. all that rhetoric about deficit and debt, they put tax cut theology over dealing with that. i'm just furious. >> david gergen, i'm furious too. in the deafening silence that was today and max baucus said maybe there's a last minute idea and all we got was a statement. they d

david gergen joins us. our senior political analyst. jamal, let me start with you and ask you about that precipitous drop among white blue collar democrats. how -- why do you think that has happened so dramatically and so quickly among a group of voters he traditionally has owned? >> well, it's a problem, let's start there. this is not good news for the president. but it is also -- we have to distinguish between white blue collared democrats and white blue collar independents and republicans. most democratic -- white democratic swing voters, those reagan democrats everyone talks about, they've left the democratic party. most of them identify themselves as independents, so we're talking about white democratic voters. this was true in the primaries in 2008. they typically end up voting for the democratic nominee or else they probably would've already left. they're satisfied, the president's got to try to figure out why that is and get them energized for the election. that's different than the population of the general election blue collar

gloria borger, ed rollins, back with us as well, senior political an lift and presidential advisor, david gergeni want to start where we ended with governor perry, tough words, he would green light, give the nod, if the israel prime minister wanted to launch a preemptive strike on iran and the report says it's advancing its nuclear program. the world could be having this very conversation early next week. what did you make of the governor's tough comments? >> i was surprised. it goes far beyond what american political leaders have generally said. president obama's nowhere near that. most military leaders in the united states want to tell israel don't do it, we will work with you if we think there's an extensional threat to israel we'll help you eliminate that. we must not green light it. i think -- it could be a very, very tough choice for the next president. governor perry, as he's often done, has taken a view that's a really hard lined view. >> ed, when you listen to the governor, i spent time with him privately, too, he's very comfortable in his skin, he's a confident man, does he get a secon

bringing in david gergen about that debate in a second.policy and national security, but the topic of illegal immigration and amnesty came up. listen to newt gingrich and mitt romney go back and forth on this one. >> i do not believe that people of the united states are going to take people that have been here a quarter century who have children and grandchildren, who are members of the community, who may have done something 25 years ago, separate them from their families and expel them. >> amnesty is a magnet. when we have had in the past programs that have said that a people who have come here legally are going to get to stay illegally for the rest of their life is only going to encourage more people to come here illegally. >> david gergen, chiming in. when you heard speaker gingrich say that, were you surprised? >> i was surprised. i have known for a long time that he believes in general, but didn't think he would break orthodoxy. newt gingrich has been far out on the right. this time moved towards the middle in something he does believ