i have never met jim mattis before.se of his nickname mad dog, i thought i better be careful when i shake his hand because he might be growling or something, but it was the opposite. i recognized quickly he has a certain reserve and a manner that would make a person want to follow him as a leader in the military, and i suspect that he never gone into the military and been in business or politics, he would be successful there as well. i only spent one hour with him but i think he has great potential to be a leader in our country. i don't think we have heard the last of jim mattis. ♪ you are minding your own business after having spent 40-plus years in the marines, you are in your native state of washington, and you get a call from vice president elect pence to meet donald trump, whom you had never met before. what did you think the meeting was about and do you have any regrets about going to the meeting or your decision to become secretary of defense? [laughter] gen. mattis: i don't live a life with regrets. i would tell

and i don't think we have heard the last of jim mattis. you are minding your own business after having spent 40-plus years in the marines. you are out in your native state, washington, and you get a call from vice president-elect pence to come and meet donald trump, whom you had never met before. what did you think that meeting was about, and do you have any regrets about going to the meeting or -- [laughter] your decision to actually become secretary of defense? gen. mattis: i don't live a life with regrets. i would tell you that if you are enjoying life, and it is shortly after an election, and the phone rings, don't answer the phone, obviously. [laughter] but on a more serious note, i was brought up by the greatest generation, and i was brought up to believe that government service is an honor, it is a privilege, but it is a duty. whether it is the president of the united states asking you, and you are a republican or democrat, it doesn't matter, as long as you are prepared to do it and know you can do it, then the response is affirmati

chain of command went from president trump to jim mattis and jim mattis was always saying that's not what we're able to achieve. so he always played a critical role. what's so scary here is that the public health institutions, the scientists, the doctors, these are the institutions of people who have been serving for decades. these are the institutions that you would hope would never start to degrade based upon this unsteady leadership from the top. and what i fear is that the president clearly wants a miracle drug, a miracle cure, and he's being told by scientists and doctors there's not going to be one. and as this plays out, they will be increasingly tested and i think all of us are at risk. and the whole world is watching this. our adversaries and allies and the diminishment of the united states as a global power is unfolding before our eyes. >> i want to go back to what you deemed the effectiveness trap. because you do seem to be saying you fear that there's going to be a point where these medical professionals sit here and wonder where can i be most effective, am i hurting my o

former defense secretary jim mattis spoke out and rebuked the president's decision telling yahoo! saying, mr. fine is a public servant in finest tradition of honest, competent governance, in my years of observation ens tif engagement with him as our department of defense's acting inspector general, he proved to be a leader. joini joining our conversation is angus king, an independent. how are you doing and what are your thoughts about this moment in which we live? >> well, the moment is extraordinary. obviously, we're all doing what we can, self-isolating, really two roles here, nicolle, one is the government, the work that we're doing on testing and supporting people on unemployment and small businesses, all of those things, but the key to it is really what we do as individuals, if we keep ourselves apart that's the only way we can break the spread of this virus. that's what's happening here in maine. i go for a walk once or twice a day with my wife. i'm self-isolating for 14 days. counting down until saturday when i can go home. >> senator, what do you make of what donald trump

and i need everyone to understand the difference between leadership, jim mattis was here a while back. i'm sure he talk about leadership. not here to talk but leadership. i'm here to talk but character. leadership is whats we do to influence others. it's a big door. and it swings out there, influencing millions of people as it did for me when is a nato commander. that big door of leadership swings on a very small hinge, and that hinge is human character. you cannot swing that door of leadership unless your, which allows it to swing. so i set out to write a book but character. we are awash in books of leadership. there are a lot of them. i wanted to write a book about that inner voyage. how we lead ourselves, that is character. and write about what you know about. i decided to write using a framework of ten admirals so we'll zip back in history 2500 years, and we're going to pull it right up to the present and talk about ten very dynamic admirals. i'm greek american, so there has to be a greek american, not american but a greek in this thing. and this is themistocles. the athens empire

. >> michael steele, is it time for jim mattis to speak up and speak out, we know he saw things that he didn't write about in his books, of him talking to men and women of the military saying we're going through a tough time in our country, he's not interested in protecting the morale of the men and women who served this country, is it time for him to say something? >> it is. but he won't. so i wouldn't spend too much time hoping and waiting for that to happen. because there's been enough time since secretary mattis was in the job for him to speak on those points. there have been enough events, there have been enough trumpism that's been out there for the secretary to address his own inside knowledge of what's really going on in departments like the pentagon, certainly in the military departments like the navy and air force and et cetera. i think the expectation for us is to take this episode in the ongoing, you know, reality tv show of the white house and categorize it appropriately and just get ready to play it all back for november, that's ultimately nicolle where we wind up, nico

i need everyone to understand the difference between leadership, jim mattis was here a while back sherry talked about leadership. not here to talk about leadership i'm here to talk about character. leadership is what we do to influence others. it's a big door and it swings out there influencing millions of people as it did for me that big door of leadership swings on a small hinge that hinge on character. you cannot swing that door of leadership unless your character allows it to swing. we are in a wash and books of character i wanted to write and book about in her voyage and how we needed ourselves for that's character. write about what you know about. i decided to write using a-frame rock work of ten admirals. organ is that back in history, 2500 years we are going to pull it right up to the present and talk about ten very dynamic admirals. there has to be a greek american, not american but greek in this thing. at least 2500 years ago there is an x essential threat athens is threatened by the persian empire. the persians of course the iranians of today. they are about to conquer athens,

to take and grab him by the lapels and focus his attention on something like this, people like jim mattis, john kelly, henry mcmaster, they're gone, have been replaced by people of lesser stature. and, third, when the president gets information like this before, we have seen from the memos that peter navarro issued that these things were circulating in the white house. these grave warnings. but the president doesn't read a lot of printed material. and he's not the kind of person who plans far ahead. the idea that he would have taken this information and said, well, we're okay now, but we need to acted aggressively in the future, that's not what he's wired for as he said yesterday at his briefing, i'm a cheerleader for the country, i don't want to create havoc. and we're all seeing right now exactly how much havoc this crisis can create. >> he's also dismantled the national security making process, where you would assess these things and move them up through the system, another consequence of that. john harwood at the white house, thank you very much. >> and jim, jim, it is notable -- >> g

america's two fundamental powers, as general jim matties tells us, are inspiration and intimidation.been left hungry for a strong dose of the first. america is being humbled by this invisible enemy, it is a stress test on our democracy. the virus exploits the cracks in our econic, and racialsoc disparities that define who is most vulnerable. the u.s. has the world's highest number of covid-19 infections and reported deaths. the white house says that statistic does not reflect the large size of the u.s. population and the compare comparitively low recovery rate. >> president trump: we were at the top, and nobody wrote it. >> brennan: but arguing over relative death rates seems at best, morbid bid. 57% of americans say the u.s. effort to deal with coronavirus is going badly. and more than half think day-to-day life in this nation will be permanently changed, according to the latest cbs poll. images of the wealthiest countries in the world facing food bank lines and digging potter's graves is shocking for those who view america as an aspiration, one that has long boasted of its leading

i need anyone to understand the difference between leadership, jim mattis was here a while back. i'm sure he talked about leadership. i'm not here to talk about leadership. i'm here toin talk about character. leadership is what we do to influence others. it's a big door and it swings out influencing millions of people as it did for me when isa nato commander. but the big door of leadership swings on a very small hinge. that hinge the human character. you cannot swing that door of leadership and less your character allows it to swing. i set out to write a book about character. we are awash in books of leadership. there are a lot of them. i wanted to write a book about that and her voyage, how we lead ourselves. that's character. and write about what you know about. i decided to write using a framework of ten admirals. we're going to sit back in history 2500 years andwi going o pull it right up to the present and talk about ten very dynamic admirals. i am greek-american sauce to be air greek american, not american but a greek indistinct. this is 2500 ago, athens, athens faces an ex

it's a member of the joint e1 chiefs, a general of maybe, you know, somebody of the status of a jim mattisou know, at the pentagon, the reason people are saying to dofá this, to appoint a general is the pentagon, they specialize in planning. that's what they do all the time, and in a war-time situation. it's just been so fascinating, though, chuck, seeing the american government response to american govu much we have e to appeared to lag by a goodr days to two weeks this virus days to two weeks this virus with everything that we'rm1 doing. the fact that you have the administration, the white house, finally coming on and saying we should be wearing face masks is something that many, many health officials say should have happened a month ago, and the fact you still don't have the president onboard with that, i think, is hugely significant. i'm not sure which kings and queens he thinks are coming to the white house that he needs to be worried about greeting with a face mask on, but the very idea t;q president trump is talking about appearance, that it won't look good for him to be seen wear

i just wrote a book about a book coming outy next week by general jim mattis called callsign chaos andhe's a guy keeps going to learn more to be a better marine, and he did that his whole life. he's got a great quote, he said if you haven't read hundreds of books you are illiterate because your own private experience is not enough to get you through life. [applause] seeid your parents live to your success, professional success? >> my father is still alive. my mom diedwo about two and half years ago. when my mom died i lost my toughest critic. i would center my book manuscripts and she would -- she was like, this is garbage on the top of the page. [laughing] my mom was blunt and direct. .. s >> your other children, what are they doing? >> my youngest is at the new school 200 feet from where i went to elementary school and my oldest boy grew up here and then went to college and then served inthe israeli army for nearly 3 years and now he's back . he decides he likes protecting people so he's going to go into law enforcement. >> the message you'd like to leave all these people with is wha

whether to stay inside and be valuable or whether or not they have to see another alternative, like jim mattisit, because when dr. birx said to you today that sunlight does kill the virus, she is perpetuating an unscientific, untested, single study presented by a nonscientist from the department of homeland security, which led to the president, as she put it, not fully digesting the data. she needed to be very clear on disavowing it, and to this point, she still has not been even this morning. >> dr. gupta, are you worried that dr. birx is letting her credibility get sort of sucked into the trump vortex? >> i really admire dr. birx, and yeah, i have to say that whether it was not pushing back strongly enough on georgia's willingness to liberalize social distancing and especially when it came to tattoo parlors. i can understand if we want to liberalize the notion of how we think about what is essential and nonessential, to what is safe and not safe, but to not push back on two parlors and that policy by the georgia governor to me was the start of a pattern. so i do think, as somebody who admire

maybe it's a member of the joint chiefs, a general of maybe, you know, somebody of the status of a jim mattiscally become the procurement czar here. >> there has been a lot of that. as you know, at the pentagon, the reason people are saying to do this, to appoint a general, is the pentagon, they specialize in planning. that's what they do all the time and in a wartime situation. it's just been so fascinating, though, chuck, seeing the american government response to this and just how much we have appeared to lag by a good ten days to two weeks this virus with everything that we're doing. the fact that you have the administration, the white house, finally coming on and saying we should be wearing face masks is something that many, many health officials say should have happened a month ago, and the fact you still don't have the president onboard with that, i think, is hugely significant. i'm not sure which kings and queens he thinks are coming to the white house that he needs to be worried about greeting with a face mask on, but the very idea that president trump is talking about appearance, th

field manual 3.5 which focused on population security and dave of course, you know, along with jim mattis and others worked on that. but it was really ray as the commander, the corps commander, who turned this into operational art on the battlefield with the joint security locations and all of that. and i think that ought to be noted. now, it's not like a lot of people weren't focusing on counter insurgency or coin as we like to call it. but not everybody really spoke c.o.i.n. fluently. there were a lot of people in the government who spoke pigeon c.o.i.n. for a lot of folks, the emphasize of the counter insurgency doctrine wasn't so much on the security part as it was on the all of government part. and we had lots of discussions inside the pentagon as we went through this particularly in our defense senior leader meetings about the whole of government and where was the rest of the government in all of this. steve got pulled into some of those on occasion. by secretary rumsfield. i came to loathe these conferences because almost inevitably, we would have a review of what was going on in i

because -- it's not like his initial team was all that great, but a lot of the people he picked then, jim mattiselly, rex tillerson, were perceived and talked about as the adults in the room. what they eventually realized is it doesn't matter if you're an adult in the room. in dealing with trump, unlike a toddler, you don't have authorities compared to the prerogatives of the president of the united states. as a result, the remaining people who are left, there is a darwinian process, where the only people who are left to staff trump are essentially the foustians, the ones willing to sell their soul to agree with whatever trump says, so they can execute their own agenda. think secretary of state mike pompeo, squeezing iran, for example. there are the flunkies, people who would never get a job in any kind of administration beyond this one. through sheer loyalty, someone like dan scavino, for example, can get hired here. then the third are the incompetents. the ones who, you know, the island of misfit wants, who would never ordinarily, you know, or have a black mark against them for one thing or an