john mccain was elected. sarah palin was elected. we are all in it together in terms of plane and keeping it going as effective as we do. what is fascinating about this story is one of the guys, probably the main guy who fought the hardest to get her on the ticket, steve schmidt, started thinking, this is a great idea. this is how weak and trump obama. -- we can trompe obama. a few months afterwards, he goes on "60 minutes" and implies he made a mistake. he takes blame for being part of it. that arc, of a guy who was a main proponent and a couple of weeks later said, if she runs in 2012, it will be a catastrophe. he has said, he says a more directly nowadays, he wonders if it was too big of a risk. possibly even a reckless choice, especially when you think how little of vetting they did. whatever you think of her comment to take someone in who had never been on the national stage. half of a few interviews and say yes, she should be the person next in line after john mccain. tavis: i have been fascinated to watch this year's president

. >> let's turn back to the republican race and john mccain. the answer to this might be pretty obvious. as john mccain was searching for a running mate, finally selecting sarah palin late in the process, my question to you is how much of that was a political decision and how much of it was a decision that john mccain truly felt that sarah palin was qualified to be vice president? >> well, that's a great question, steve. i'm not sure we were able to get to the bottom of that sufficiently to answer that in the spirit in which you intended. it's clear they had a lot of political problems they needed to address. given that john mccain was being tied to george bush whose record at that point was unpopular with a large number of independent and centrist voters in the election they needed a game changing pick. in a perfect world he would have found someone unambiguously able to be president. most he considered seriously, all men, i think would have been seen as instantly qualified to

[laughter] one of the most difficult choices was ed harris for john mccain. i had nobody else in mind in. nobody. the sense of humor, the unpredictable combust ability all of the qualities of john mccain even if harris was so thin. he gestured it to eat more. [laughter] and he gained weight. once that happened we are lucky he said yes. woody harrelson he is a dream and negative i have not seen a movie i do not like him. one last point*, coby did not want to make a propaganda piece. we had no interest in not telling the best story and respectful of these people as human beings trying to do the best that they could. but up against a series of complexities and each other that would doom them to this dysfunction. you cannot do that without the greatest possible actors. i cast my three favorite because i believed and i need did you to go in with them to experience this in the most empathetic and possible way. that was our goal every character. >> i want to to lodge a complaint. look at julienne more and sarah palin. it seems unfair to cast somebody who is not as a

we thought that john would do all right in the debates but we never thought the press would say john mccain won debate against obama. there are huge moment in the campaign. we knew obama was going to give a good speech at the convention and john would do his best but not the operator at the level obama was. trying to figure out how to come out of the republican convention in a situation where we are not down 20 points to keep the race competitive. we decided to take a risk. the risk was through the prism of a political risk. he may make mistakes. she may say things that are in error that may have to be cleaned up. we looked closely at the rollout of dan quayle and the mistakes that were made there and tried to prevent them. but it was a decision trying to win the campaign. >> my decision to participate in the book. i laughed when he reached up and people say it is our story. they talk to many people. we have been transparent that we were too out of the -- two out of the many. won a presidential campaign ends you immediately go to the university of pennsylvania. winning and losing side. go t

one layer out, senior republican, hard core partisan republican who saw the way it john mccain behaved and reluctantly -- there are a million things wrong with barack obama. he doesn't understand foreign policy but seems to have run such a good campaign and senator mccain was so at sea, i am comfortable -- more comfortable with obama becoming president at that moment in late 2008 early 2009. i think now many of those same people would go back and revise that because they began to have much less charitable view or positive view of barack obama's management skills as they have played out over these three years -- and policies. they also feel even the things they gave him credit for that he would run such a good campaign so he would at least run a good white house. talking about partisan republicans. they changed on that and say we were wrong about that. not only was he as liberal as we thought he was going to be but has not run a good administration. >> your own sense on that and those of your colleagues. >> one of the things i like about the movie is how john mccain is portrayed. you se

that's the real obama. >> i'm john mccain and i approve this message. >> the mccain campaigning, we learned this in the book "game change," looking for something to try to jump start, sarah palin was one of those opportunities, this ad was another. >> they understood one of obama's strenltss in 2008 was he was a larger than life figure, he had become a real celebrity, he was a gifted orator, had a compelling personal story. in politics you try and take someone's greatest strengths and turn it into a negative. basically saying, yeah, the guy's a celebrity, he talks a really lead, does he have the experience? so that was part of the way that they tried to turn around the campaign, although obviously it was unsuccessful. >> let me turn to my students. cynthia and caesar seated next to each other at the washington center. your reaction to either the obama campaign ad or the john mccain ad? approximate i really like the obama ad. i like how they compared him to britney spears and paris hilton. y i don't see how they can be used negatively against him but i guess in this case it was used negative

listen, i think john mccain would have been a fine commander in chief. esident. i didn't hesitate to vote for john. but i certainly respect nicole's position on this and her integrity. you know, as you look at the race, i think there's an important story. as i've said, this is about the collision of idealism and cynicism. this is about the risk that ambition fuels that were made. and i think that we put someone on the ticket who was manifestly not prepared to be absolutely, i suggested that to him. >> i'm impressed he didn't lock himself in the tv bubble of fox news, but he was on fox news yesterday with chris wallace, asked about "game change" asked about you, let's ln

so, john mccain and a variety of other republicans don't like it. they feel that it takes too much of a regulatory approach and they also don't like the fact that it's being fast track to the senate floor. they think the senate should take more time on this. sir john mccain and the other republicans have introduced their own alternative measure. >> what kind of industries are interested in cybersecurity legislation? >> welcome it affects any sort of utilities. so because the idea with the lieberman-collins bill was critical infrastructure -- saddam anything say electrical grids where if you have some sort of pact could have a devastating impact, and so it would give the homeland security department regulatory authority. so many companies that are involved in something that might get labeled critical infrastructure come on t information technology companies that build these computer grids, any tech companies have an interest here. >> are they more supportive of the lieberman-collins approach or the john mccain approach? >> i think a lot of them are s

conference earlier in the day making a break from a prominent republican supporter, arizona senator john mccain, the 2008 republican nominee. let's take you back to yesterday and the exchange between senator mccain and defense secretary leon panetta, this before the senate armed services committee. >> the president said yesterday he has taken no options off the table, mr. panetta, in the case of syria. you said in your opening statement that includes "potential military options if necessary." you said in your statement, and yet, admiral sterling silver rit tas and general mattis stated there had been no contingent sill planning either innate coor centcom. will there be some contingency planning? >> we have looked at a number of options that could be involved here. >> but will there be plans? >> we have not done the detailed planning because we are waiting for the direction of the president to do that. >> the president, mr. secretary, president obama issued a presidential directive stating "the prevention of mass atrocities is -- this is a presidential directive "a core national security interes

listen, i think john mccain would have been a fine commander in chief. a good president. i didn't hesitate to vote for john. but i certainly respect nicole's position on this and her integrity. you know, as you look at the race, i thinkhe

is helping john mccain. look what happened four years ago. we put america to sleep with our... with our primary four years ago. barack obama and hillary clinton nearly gouged each other's eyes out. what happened? he won. look at all those governors from wisconsin to ohio to michigan to pennsylvania. primaries make candidates stronger. it forces the media to talk about our candidates. it keeps the focus on barack obama which is what at the end of the day this election is going to be about. it will be a referendum on whether people are better off today than they were three or four years ago, which they're not. and it will be a referendum on whether barack obama is a man of his word and fulfills the promises that he makes to the american people. >> schieffer: do you really mean that john mccain put the voters to sleep? >> no, i think our process did. i think our process did. we had no drama at all. we were lockstep in the middle of march. we had our nominee. all of the excitement, all of the energy was on hilla

senator john mccain's calls for a strike on syria and talk to middle east expert professor paul sheldon foot from the university of california professor very good evening thanks for being on our international mccain has no real sway does the white hurt inside but are seriously should we take his comments for military action in syria do you think. we should take it very seriously because here is a man who was the republican presidential candidate last. road goes around expressing what unfortunately some republicans believe our republican gives so many of us opposed him there was an organization called vietnam veterans against john mccain and hadn't seen mccain bumper stickers which are very good republican voters . when you can't get conservative republican vietnam veterans to vote or they should be there but they did that years around zero instead they voted for this man and so he's still very dangerous here's a man who advocates a hundred years of military bases no no limit on spending and the current batch of republican candidates other than ron paul who are our chicken hawks they nev

john mccain, four years ago, it was 47% had said they would vote enthusiastically for john mccain. ken blackwell, does that concern you? >> it really doesn't. at the end of the day there was a different mix of candidates and at this point in the competition, john mccain was clearly the preferred candidate. that's not the case now. competition whether it's economic competition or political competition is good. this is a vetting process. this is the opportunity for those who aspire to be the standard bear to speak to the grassroots across this nation. at the end of the day if you begin to look at the top line numbers, the republican candidates are actually starting to do better in the competition against president obama and so as a result, this whole notion that there's a devastating impact on the candidates on the republican side as a consequence of the competition, i think is misleading. we will see a stronger republican candidate as we get to tampa. now, i told you earlier that right now there's no clear winner before tampa, i actually happen to believe that there will be a clear

led air campaign is what senator john mccain is suggesting and we reached out to the white house for department reaction and we have not responded. this is in coincidence that the effort to get a u.n. security resolution comes the day after the elections in russia. president putin, other leaders, now hope with the election out of the way, we will be able to focus on foreign policy a lot more and a lot of leaders hope that he will change russia's position, obviously russia has until now alongside china, vetoed the security council resolutions calling on assad to step aside but on the flip side of that, the russian folks saying they have looked to the draft of the u.n. resolution and it is not "balanced enough," to vote for it so we wait-and-see. >>shepard: we will look forward to your chat online with the top headlines at foxnews.com/shep and jonathan's picture is on the right hand side and check that and jonathan will pop up in your living room. professional football players get paid to hit each other. duh. a new report says some got paid to intentionally hurt their opponents and the

senator john mccain and secretary panetta went after it.>guest: senator john mccain for the third day running was ling the charge calling for airstrikes. >> how many more have to die? 10,000 more? 20,000 more? how many more? >> what don't make sense is to take unilateral action at this point as secretary of defense before i recommend we put our sons and daughters in uniform in harm's way, i have to make very sure that we know what the mission is, i have to make very sure we know whether we can achieve that mission, at what rice and whether it will make matters better or worse. >> defense secretary warned against the united states taking unilateral action saying there are no simple answers with regard to syria and he left open the possibility the united states taking action but john mccain reminded him that he was president clinton's chief of staff when they got involved in the bosnian conflict which was a humanitarian mission. >>shepard: they are aware that is like striking iran and how tied in it is and this is all political. >>guest: very

john mccain lost 19 states. is the mccain example really one the romney people want to talk about. what happened to john mccain in november? santorum took evens to the act of god phrase. gingrich didn't seem pleased with pressure from the supporters to get out of the race. gingrich's campaign though did call alabama and mississippi both must win states and santorum has his own strategy. >> at this primary and the primary next door in mississippi, both of next week and we will once again for the ninth time reset this primary race. >> if we win mississippi, this will be a two-person race. if this is a two-person race, we will nominate a conservative as president of the united states. >> santorum's super pac is making that argument for him. saying in a super tuesday statement, based on his performance and his record, it is time for newt gingrich to exit the process. gingrich certainly fired back. >> we are staying in this race because i believe that it's going to be impossible for a moderate to win the general election. >> santorum appeared to be hands off saying the super pac is acti

is doing this god bless john mccain because he is opposed to the man in the white house so is lindsey graham so is joe lieberman so are all these people who call themselves independents and republicans and who just cannot stand the fact that president obama is sitting in the white house and they're not pretty interesting theory is that you don't think senator mccain is able to get enough people on his side in terms of action in syria i don't think so i hope cooler heads prevail i hope heads of nato and elsewhere understand that this is not live you know this is a very different situation and they also understand i hope that what they did in libya is not necessarily blooming like a flower or i think it's a good plan i think a lot of people thought the task and destruction of coffee and his family and that v. for victory let's move on now i tell you something else in that eastern libya a pocket of rebels that began this were the largest number of al qaida in iraq by a factor of five the war on al qaida in iraq killing our soldiers killing our marines came from eastern libya. very very i

is doing is god bless john mccain because he is opposed to the man in the white house so is lindsey graham so is joe lieberman so are all these people who call themselves independents and republicans and who just cannot stay in the fact that president obama is sitting in the right house and they are not pretty interesting so you say you don't think senator mccain is able to get enough people on his side in terms of action in syria. i don't think so i hope you are here to provoke your heads in nato and elsewhere understand that this is not will be a this is a very different situation and they also understand what they did libya is not necessarily. i think it's a good point i think a lot of people started to ask and destruction of khadafi and his family and said before victory let's move on only thirty some of the middle eastern libya popular of rebels who began this were the largest number in iraq by a factor of five to warn cardinal rat killing our soldiers killing our marines came from eastern libya very very interesting to think about really appreciate you being here and lawrence

two months after hillary clinton winning -- losing the nomination, john mccain won his nomination "having dodged a bullet after bullet, mccain clinched his party's nomination on march 4, concluding one of the gleatest political victories in history." why such a lag between clinton's nomination and determining the nominee late in the summer? >> that is an excellent question. it goes to the heart of this election with sarah palin. president mccain had been around presidential politics and he enjoyed the opportunity to go through the rituals that the party nominee gets to go through. one of which is hiring someone or retaining someone in this space, a respected washington lawyer, to go through and begin a process of studying the prospect of potential candidates. given it was a mccain operation which would be likely to have loose lips and a lot of leaking. this was kept re relatively confidential in real-time. the day we decided to do this show was the day john mccain went on imus' program and talked about the betting program in a way he was not supposed to do. that was one of the last times

john mccain wants to continue george bush's economic policy. as president he'd provide no tax bras to 101 million americans but keep tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas. he wants tax breaks for big oil and would tax your health care benefits for the first time ever. look behind you. we can't afford more of the same. >> reaction or comment? >> i don't think it's a good idea for the obama administration to compare mccain and bush? it was a good strategy mplts even mccain had trouble trying to separate himself from bush. i think overall it was an effective commercial. >> let me turn to isaiah mohammed from dick kinson college. do you have a thought about this ad? >> i thought about while reading "game change," it showed the country definitely wanted something new. that ad definitely exploited that current in the country, that people wanted something different new and that mccain and the republican party couldn't provide necessarily. >> i thought it was a good strategy. >> which gets to the core points in gettysburg college before the

and john mccain was never a manton shy away from an emotional moral argument.t's just the way he's put together. there are many in the white house who would love to be able to support him. they just fear that consequence of doing what's recommended by mccain, by the saudis will be that even more civilians will die. so they're looking for some way that diplomacy can bring a resolution that will change the regime in syria without having a civil war. that's proving extremely difficult but the administration hasn't given up hope. >> meanwhile, you were privy to looking at some of the reporting, the intelligence reporting on osama bin laden, the final days. fascinating stuff. our own reporter in pakistan interviewed the wife's brother so this is the last wife who is now been talking to investigators. wanted to play a little bit of that interview. >> why are they still holding your sister? >> translator: to this day, i don't know the reason. i asked her, maybe they're holding you because of information you have. she said she's already told them everything she knows.

but, what guess me is john mccain saying it as well. let's roll the tape. >> i have been in very tough campaigns. i don't think i have seen one that was as personal and as characterized by so many attacks as these are. and, frankly, one of the reasons is the super pacs. >> bill: how do you reply that you guys are damaged because you are beating each other up so much. >> these super pacs i think john mccain is right. the super pacs are a new feature in american politics right now. big money in the case of the santorum campaign and gingrich campaign a single billionaire responsible for the lion's share of the funding of the super pacs and that has a big impact. i think the process is going to go on longer because of the super pac dollars that come in. i can tell you, you know, i recognize that down the road we are going to get attacked by a billion-dollar obama machine and in some respects this toughens us up a bit and gets the attacks out there. people get a little tired of them and hopefully we will be able to regain the strength once w

john mccain was watching backstage.he had never given a speech with that kind of focus or the kind of audience. he is watching with mounting excitement as she gives the speech. he can believe how good she is. she finishes the speech and mccain is over the moon. one of his advisers says that partly to the speech, her teleprompter was malfunctioning. the teleprompter was moving too slowly. mccain says, "i hope that doesn't happen to me." imposed onandicappe her by the technology. the campaign was on tenterhooks. she hit it out of the park. she was an asset for the campaign. for a week or 10 days after that, she was. there was concern in the national polls. people on the democratic side were freaking out on how she injected some much freshness into that campaign. had stumblesshe and the financial crisis kicked him that the game changed again and pick began to of complications. the campaign gave obama to rise to the location. others felt confident about his abilities. >> you chronicle the preparation process as the campaign

john mccain also wishes the iraq war was still going on, that has become a rump minority view even in his own party. >> it's time for us to bring the troops home as soon as we possibly can. >> i think we're risking the lives of young men and women in a mission that may frankly not be doable. >> any time you have such a shocking development i think it's important to take a look and see what the situation is and whether it's possible to continue on. >> so this doesn't make you more inclined to move us out faster? >> well, it makes me more determined to make sure we're getting the troops home. it's been a decade, frankly, now that we've gotten bin laden and weakened al qaeda, we are knee a stronger position to transition than we would have been two or three years ago. >> it's time. it's been a decade and now we've gotten bin laden and weakened al qaeda we're in a stronger position to transition than we would have been two or three years ago. plans made two or three year ago may be sped up. politics are different than first glance would have you think they are. >>> josh rogin covers natio

. >> -- tavis: john mccain. your former colleague. john mccain has now called for u.s. air strikes on syria. your thoughts about that? >> one of the things i talk about in "while america sleeps" is our tendency to invade a country rather than having a calibrated approach, so we go into afghanistan, and we know bin laden is not there anymore, and we stay there forever. i call it the in for a penny, in for a pound, where you do the whole thing. president obama did it right in libya. he did not do the ground troops. because these same principles can be applied to syria. as i do not think this is a bad idea. as invading syria or internationally or the united states. i do not think that is the right answer. i would say it is on the table. what he is doing there is criminal. even the arab league is dying to get him out of there. there needs to be an more calibrated approach, where we do not put troops there and stay there forever. that is the best way to go. >> president obama met with netanyahu at the white house. much is still being discussed. tavis: where israel is concern

senator john mccain goes "on the record."or, nice to see you, sir. >> thank you, greta. >> greta: let me start with the recent tweet of yours that says good news senate just passed stock act with amendment banning outrageous bonuses for fannie mae and freddy excess. next step signed into law. i like the stock act. i think it is an important signal to send. although i don't think it has as much impact as it is advertised but we did have an amendment on it to cut out the outrageous bonuses for fannie and freddie execs. they claim they can't attract good people unless they pay them $500,000 and $700,000 in bonuses when we have people serving in the military in the cabinet and many other positions of responsibility so i thought we had maybe some patriotic americans who would like to sort out this mess of fannie and freddie without having to have hundreds of thousands of dollars in bonuses. by the way, their predecessors as you know ripped off millions. >> greta: we are even paying for their legal fees. it is extraordinary. they a

according to senator john mccain and his colleagues, senator joe lieberman and lindsey graham. they have been dubbed the three amissionos. joining me is one of those amissionos, senator john mccain the republican senator from arizona. good morning to you, senator, thank you for being with us. >> thanks. >> so curious, if you go in and you do intervene in syria, and the rebels were to take over, and it doesn't work exactly as planned what happens then? that's the flip side to this, right? >> well, one thing that would happen is that syria would be split from iran and the head of central command said that if assad failed it would be the biggest blow to iran in 25 years. cut off lebanon from iranian influence, hezbollah would probably wither. it would be a seismic event. but most importantly, look most importantly people are being massacred. children are being maimed, raped, tortured, 10,000 people estimates are 8,000 to 10,000 people have already been massacred and the united states does that have ability with other nations to bring this to a halt as we were able to do in libya.

when he found himself in a similar situation, running against john mccain. after super tuesday, john mccain certainly didn't have the delegates to become the nominee. but at that point he was on track to get those delegates. and mitt romney made the decision, and it was a difficult one, to step aside. >> joining us by phone, the chief white house correspondent for politico, mr. mike allen. good morning. >> good morning, willie. >> eric fernstrom, you heard him saying in no uncertain terms that it's time for rick santorum and newt gingrich to step aside so that the party can rally behind mitt romney. any chance either of them will? >> well, santorum is going to fight on. but eric fernstrom told politico that romney has an insurmountable lead. so they're making this case on a number of fronts. he pointed out that in mitt romney's remarks, he was acting like the nominee. they think that by projecting confidence, even though he doesn't quite have the number, that he can give off the aura of the nominee. we're going do hear him talking less and less about other r

. >> john mccain was on "meet the press." he talked about succezkding. >> the relationship is wonderful. when these things happen it just really sets back everything a great deal. we have troop tons ground in afghanistan. we have control of key parts of the country. >> do you agree? >> sure on some aspects. we have done great work. this isn't about what happens when we're there. it happens when we leave. the time line of 2014, we can't rial achieve sustainable success in the timetable we have been set. not just the president's timetable but five years, ten years, who knows. sure american troops do a great job on the ground but senator john mccain misses the large points. we need to focus on missions our military can be success. it wasn't all these troops that went into pakistan and got bin laden. where we're at right now, i think the question senator john mccain sthould be asking is why should american troops die dying for a foreign democracy if they don't want them in the villages. we stay out of the afghan villages and on t

>> could it have been john mccain? >> john mccain. for most of 2008, he really did.not a republican thing. the history of it, romney has a problem with the media. >> let's talk about john mccain and particularly, about sarah palin. we heard her saying she wants the race to continue. she also said last night, it's almost as if she likes to toy with the media. like the media's a little mouse and she's the cat. maybe i would get in a brokerage situation. >> she's in some ways, gotten more confident in terms of the way she plays with the media. she's cared about her public image. whether in alaska or on the national stage. where she's just coming to grips with what it means to being a national candidate, but after that, rash and bold in terms of trying to do various things, both in terms of traditional and online media, to try to keep herself in the public eye as much possible, even though she holds no elected office. >> your book obviously went through her as well as the other campaigns and had all kinds of amazing, wonderful, juicy things in it, but the movie that's co

arizona senator john mccain. welcome aboard. >> thank you, sean.with you again, i remember in your campaign in '08, there was a certain candidate, perhaps casually, certainly naively said, iran and cuba and venezuela -- they are not the former soviet, they are not a serious threat. who was that? [chuckles] >> i think i know who it was and i know that after this president was -- became president in 2009, one and-a-half million iranians were demonstrating in the streets because of a corrupt election and they were chanting in english, sean, obama, obama, are you with us? or are you with them? he refused to say a word of encouragement to those people. and we watched a young women bleed to death in the streets in tescprawn he said, he didn't want to jeopardize his chances of negotiating with the islamic republic of iran. and we know how that turned out. >> sean: you know, senator, you know, you were a prisoner of war nearly 6 years. many involved, you suffer today the impact of your service to your country. we all admire you for what you have done. i ha