we have experts with us, david fromme was a speechwriter for president bush and david kusnet.hank you for joining us. you have sat in that chair, and you have written the axis of evil speech, george bush gave in to 2002. you have done some soul searching about that speech. what should president obama and speechwriters be most worried about? >> they should be most worried about if they're going to -- last week president obama talked in estonia. that was a powerful speech. the president had something to say that was credible, that was important. the president is now about to urge the united states into going to war, exactly the opposite side of the war he advocated going into exactly a year ago. back then we were going to go war against assad. now we're going to war with assad. back then we needed congressional authority. now we don't. the president has to make sense of that. unlike estonia, i fear his message this time is not credible. >> david kusnet, we know we'll be hearing about the strategy the president has tonight. but let's talk about the threat. in polls, americans fee

david fromme who wrote for george w. bush and senior editor at "the atlantic" and dave kusnet. david, let me start with you, the president and ban ki-moon both emphasizing this is unusual. there's only been six times that the security council has met at this high level. of course, the choreography is already done, the alliance already set to pass this resolution. and yet as you well known, presidential words matter a great deal, particularly as we go into bomb a new country here. what did you make of the line the president just walked in speaking to those allies? >> well, the president is evidently trying to do is to -- after the fact. the bombs has already begun, build a network of legal authority. there is a question on what basis is the united states now at war in syria? remember, a year ago when the president was proposing to bomb on the other side of this war, he insisted he needed congressional permission. this time he doesn't have that permission so he is saying that he's allowed to do so under the grant of authority to president bush to call for war. the bombing has star