joining me now is douglas brinkley back with me actually. joining me now olivia, washington correspondent for new york magazine. olivia you get the first word. do you think the president has been fundamentally changed by this president? >> well i think that donald trump has revealed issues that already existed in the press. he's also prompted a lot of self-reflecting and debate amongst the press about how best to cover him. things maybe we didn't talk about before or we didn't analyze too closely before. i think that can be a good thing. i think it can be a bit of a distraction. but i don't really know that the president has changed the media. he's not changing the way that people are reporting. every is doing their jobs the same way. they're investigating the same way. i think he has made everyone's attention span shorter. there's that saying about trump i think others have said. he makes everybody a little bit like him. i think that's true to some extent about the press core as well. we all have that short attention span the way he does be

joining me now presidential historian douglas brinkley and national correspondent for "the atlantic."entlemen, good evening to you. thanks for joining us here on saturday evening with the government shutdown. let's talk, james. jeff sessions announced that daca would be rescinded. he didn't have to do that, but he's a hardliner on immigration. is this shutdown a self-inflicted wound, do you think? >> i think the internal dynamics of the party have been the main driver here. if i could just say, what's striking to me, i was actually thinking about other presidents at this stage of their presidency. douglas brinkley is the historian, but in my role as amateur journalist, it is remarkable if you go back to the last six or eight presidents, uh have the list, by the time they were one year in, almost everything that was important or going to accomplish had already been done. if you apply that kind of marker to donald trump, it's not simply that no other president has a shutdown in his first year, approval ratings below 50%, nobody had protests, but all the others had essentially gone towar

certainly douglas brinkley, you'll be part of that effort when it happens.it's always great to have your perspective. good to have you, professor. >> thank you so much. >>> on this monday morning there's a ton of news. what do you say? let's get after it. >>> the president insisting that his two greatest assets in life have been his mental stability and, quote, being like really smart. >> i have no reason to question his mental fitness. >> the allegations are nothing but a pile of trash. >> we've seen steve bannon apologize. >> i don't think this is going to immediately solve that feud between him and the president. >>> actresses wearing all black at the golden globes in solidarity with the me too movement. >> this is as much as a bold statement to make. >> the new statement is on the horizon. >>> this is "new day" with chris cuomo and alisil al i -- >> now that they used that -- >> it's a big reason we named "new day" because of the hope of tomorrow. >> yes, it's on the horizon. >>> good morning. welcome to your new day, monday january 8th. >>> up first, ad

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the enemy of the people and so that is a big concern -- >> political analyst and historian and douglas brinkleyal historian. thank you both for being here. you heard the sound from senator flake trying to clarify but it sounds to me nevertheless he does plan to invoke joseph stalin's name in speaking about our president from the floor of the senate, which i still think is pretty darn remarkable. >> it is remarkable. but you know, donald trump has had people compare him to dictators before. any time you want to annihilate the press, that's what fascist dictators too and the point jeff flake wants to make. it's always a slippery slope when you do analogies to muse leanny or stalin so you saw flake walking that back a little bit. the idea accusing stalin in saying the language is sim layer, it raises the russia probe stories. donald trump is to influenced by moscow and putin and kind of more in mentally aligned with russian thinking than traditional american love of the first amendment. >> well, we know as a result of some of the words apparently used by the president recently, we know house democ

joining us now to make sense of it all, douglas brinkley, cnn presidential historian. for being here. how do you think history will look at this president? or the first year of this presidency? >> it is an asterisks president. nobody really believed he really is president and that's because of the fbi, justice department constantly investigating him. you're waiting any day for a shoe to drop. so he's been -- had a cloud hanging over him throughout the year. there have been some concrete accomplishments, the economy is doing well and that's a big thing for a politician to have going for him. but alas, here we are, one year anniversary, and we have a government shutdown going in. when you have 35 or 7% approval rating, it is very hd tonite the country on anything. it is historic lows that you put up on your screen. >> you talk about the stock market, he said in jest yesterday, have you ever heard the phrase it is the economy, stupid? sure, this is really helping him, the jobs numbers and the stock market. where has he succeeded? >> theodore roosevelt once said about the

i think we have turned douglas brinkley into david brinkley. aware of that, i apologize for that. >> we both know doug, sorry, doug. >>> our conversation continues in a moment with david brinkley and others. the first vote in the senate to avoid a shutdown, minutes away. >>> john cornyn weighing in saying no deal. >> that's pretty definitive. the white house was pretty clear a few hours ago. i didn't think anything was going to get done. what will now be the question is whether anything can be salvaged, whether they can get something quickly done. how long this shutdown lasts. >> how does this work? assuming this vote happens at 10:00, there's no deal, what then in terms of trying to get a deal? >> one other piece of news that jonathan martin, maggie's colleague at the new york times reported doug jones of alabama is now a yes. you have four red state democrats come over. that is going to keep happening. normally everything is trump and we get that, this is one instance where republicans of the house passed this, there are republicans in the se

douglas brinkley, craig shirley, and also laura brown. thank you all for being here. me address the s t shutdown on. i know it has never happened when one party has controlled the white house and both houtse, but anything that comes to mind in terms of the historical precedent for what we're seeing? >> the last 25 years, '95, 96 ['], 2013. so we've had them, but this is very order that when you have a republicans controlling the senate and congress and you have a republican president, to have a shutdown like this, it is nonsensical. you would think that they would be able to hammer out a deal on this very quickly. what it tells you is that for the democrats they are showing we've got a spine. that we've picked daca, the d.r.e.a.m.ers issue, and we'll hold firm. and donald trump is worried about the alt-right. he came in on reforming immigration. so trump goes one way one day, one way the next. so in the end it might have to be solved in the senate by mitch mcconnell and chuck schumer come up with an agreement and then bring to donald trump. i'm not sure he will be abl

joining us now to talk more about it is douglas brinkley, cnn presidential historian, a former member of president obama's national security counsel and paige pate, defensive constitutional law professor. president trump's tweets, the ones saying she a very stable genius, where does this fit into a big pick historically. have previous presidents weighed in over their mental fitness? >> no. often presidents have had to defend their health i mean when woodrow wilson had a stroke, people were wondering what kind of position he was in. 2008 eisenhower had a heart attack in 1955. you have to come out and show are vigorous. this is the psychological health of the president. some people raised that about lyndon johnson in 19 skating when he decided not to run for re-election and, of course, richard nixon in his last months, i edited nixon's tape, you can hear him screaming at people saying crazy rational things and say yes, boss, fought listen to him. the fact that he came out like he did donald trump, reminding me of nixon saying i believe not a crook. donald trump basically said i'm not a

cnn presidential historian douglas brinkley.egal analyst page pate, and director for the center of politics at the university of virginia, larry sabato. we heard them saying trump's use of the phrase fight back may be a poor word choice. do you agree? >> i think it is evidence of obstruction of justice. all of the things you put up on the screen, the things president trump has done during the course of this investigation, they're all legal steps that a president can take. he can remove the fbi director. he can criticize the fbi. he can do all of those things as president. so long as the reason for doing them is not under a corrupt intent. he's not trying to protect himself. but when he comes out and publicly says this is my attempt to fight back, then i think it's crystal clear that all of his actions are an attempt to protect himself and perhaps people close to him from the consequences of this investigation. and if that's why he's doing these things, that can be obstruction of justice. >> so if there is proof of obstruction of

. >> here to discuss all this is douglas brinkley, cnn presidential historian and new york times journalisticholas kristof. great to have both of you here for this discussion. a sitting u.s. senator will go on the senate floor and criticize the president of his own party historically speaking can you give us the significance of this? >> and on the day that the government might close. look, it just tells you there really is a type of neo civil war going on within the republican party. jeff flake is determined to tell fellow republicans that there's another road than trumpism. he's positioning himself to be a flash point person to donald trump. now, choosing stalin may have been a mistake for him out of the gate, but the point we understand that he's making is we have a president who is saying that the first amendment is garbage, that despises reporters, that's threatening journalists around the world. so i think it is a courage moment for jeff flake. that's the famous book john f. kennedy wrote about senators willing to stand up and speak truth to power. >> nicholas, we have a few exerts of

douglas brinkley, pleasure as always. for swinging by. >> thank you, brooke. >>> next on cnn, the world's most valuable company announcing 20,000 new jobs and bonuses for an employee is something i'm sure the president will mention as he's there in pennsylvania. how much credit can he take for this great news from apple? we'll talk about that next. she's nationally recognized for her compassion and care. he spent decades fighting to give families a second chance. but to help others, they first had to protect themselves. i have afib. even for a nurse, it's complicated... and it puts me at higher risk of stroke. that would be devastating. i had to learn all i could to help protect myself. once i got the facts, my doctor and i chose xarelto®. xarelto®... to help keep me protected. once-daily xarelto®, a latest-generation blood thinner... ...significantly lowers the risk of stroke in people with afib not caused by a heart valve problem. it has similar effectiveness to warfarin. xarelto® works differently. warfarin interferes