speak with monica lewinsky and you obviously couldn't speak with the likes of attorney general john mitchell and his wife who are deceased but when i went through the book i felt like you have. i have to say it must be a great tribute to the research that you did. how long did it take to do the book from the conception to making the proposal until tonight. i would say about two and half your process. semi people lived there. in the news. it was just methodically going through. my team and i would go through the news article about the watergate and the people who are there every time we found the name have to find out what happened to that person. i they alive or dead. call e-mail or wrote. or all three. a kind of took a a while to look through every name. there were a lot of dry leads. for example there was name one named betty bradley who i came across her name in the story one article and one obituary and that was it. wrote every member of the family and then a member of the family calls this gentleman and says our mom left a box of audiotapes we have never done anything with them. they sh

although multiple members in president nixon's administration gravitated including ambassador john mitchell and his wife martha and a number of white house aides including rosemary was, president nixon's confidential secretary that you might remember. this is the first book joseph has written. -- >> lisa bloomer as a writer. he worked on the federal and state levels in the politics for more than 30 years. he served as a writer and communications manager in the ronald reagan white house and has a top campaign government aid to california governors pete wilson and arnold schwarzenegg schwarzenegger. you might say he's had a political leaning towards the republican party, but i didn't find any political bias towards one party or the other in his book. he tells it as history has recorded it in my opinion. and so, let me begin tonight with some questions from the author and then we will open up to questions from the audience followed by the opportunity to purchase the book and have joseph sign it. thank you for being here. the first question as a first-time book author how did you decide to writ

there was no proof john mitchell, the attorney general broke into the watergate or was involved in that. it could be brought as a separate crime. however, i think here you're going to see an underlying crime that the obstruction is going to be the motive for. and that i think is going to be critical to this prosecution. >> paul. >> i always agree with my man, nick. he's right. i don't think mueller would bring an obstruction case without collusion. here's the thing. trump is sure acting like michael flynn has the dirt on him and trump is acting like he will do anything to prevent that dirt from coming out. the good news from our democracy is that special counsel mueller already knows so flynn has pled guilty. he's cooperating with mueller. so mr. president, a pardon at this point won't do you any good. >> that's the other question. i mean the idea -- there was this period where it seemed like pardon entered the discussion. that's when we got are you going to pardon flynn on the white house lawn. we got the tweet and reporting. we're now getting reporting later it was on the table. you w

. >> during the nixon administration, john mitchell would say watch what we do and not what we say. with president trump it is the same rule be means it the opposite. he said what he wants to do and what actually happens is often far less than the announcement made it seem. so the needle i think they're trying to thread here is make an announcement and noise and show the people in trump country and western pennsylvania that you are fighting for them and at the same time not interrupting the economic recovery they depend on in the midterms with a trade war. >> that sounds about right. i love leo girard because he is a labor leader. >> he is authentic. >> there are not many of them left. >> and i interviewed him -- and donald trump would say central casting. >> i interviewed him in the headquarters and the first thing he did is slide a cookie toward you and said have a bite. and he body and soul represents the steel workers. and yes, they will all be happy. the steel workers, don't forget there is a special election in the pittsburgh area that involves a lot of steel people, pa 18 hap

john bolton. andrea mitchell, describe him in ten seconds or less. >> a bomb thrower, a knife fighter, a bureaucraticly smart. super hawk. >> so we have that to look forward to in terms of the international implications as it pertains to our place in the world and our national security but what matters to trump seems to be from my knowledge of him over the past decade or so is money and sex and the lawyer for former porn star stormy daniels is turning up the heat on president trump ahead of his client's highly-anticipated "60 minutes" interview. michael avenatti is demanding the trump organization preserve all records related to his client. he says he plans to subpoena them citing "unmistakable links between donald trump's company and a secrecy agreement she signed and is now suing to get nullified." that was followed up by this cryptic tweet. a photo of a disk and a caption implying that he has evidence. "if a picture is worth a thousand words, how many words is this worth?" president trump denies any and all affairs, including allegations from former "playboy" playmate karen mcdougal. she claims sh

john dowd, resigning. what it means for the president as he faces challenges on multiple fronts. that's next. this is "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. risk of stroke due to afib, a type of irregular heartbeat not caused by a heart valve problem. but no matter where i ride, i go for my best. so if there's something better than warfarin, i'll go for that too. eliquis. eliquis reduced the risk of stroke better than warfarin, plus had less major bleeding than warfarin. eliquis had both. don't stop taking eliquis unless your doctor tells you to, as stopping increases your risk of having a stroke. eliquis can cause serious and in rare cases fatal bleeding. don't take eliquis if you have an artificial heart valve or abnormal bleeding. while taking eliquis, you may bruise more easily... and it may take longer than usual for any bleeding to stop. seek immediate medical care for sudden signs of bleeding, like unusual bruising. eliquis may increase your bleeding risk if you take certain medicines. tell your doctor about all planned medical or dental procedures. i'm still going for my best. and for eliquis. ask your doct

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. >>> right now on "andrea mitchell reports," third time's the charm? president trump names johntional security advisor, the third in barely 15 months. how will the hawkish former bush official shake up foreign policy? >> the national security advisor, like all of the president's top advisors, serve at his pleasure. and he may be a different kind of president than others, but i think that's what the people voted for. >>> the art of no deal. president trump now threatening to veto the bipartisan spending bill that already passed congress. a bill the white house, including the vice president, said he would sign. >> this bill is hardly perfect. far from it. and i'm here to tell you, folks, it is filled with one example after another that proves that when it comes to president donald trump, it's promises made and promises

. >>> right now on "andrea mitchell reports," third time's the charm? president trump names john bolton his new national security advisor, the third in barely 15 months. how will the hawkish former bush official shake up foreign policy? >> the national security advisor, like all of the president's top advisors, serve at his pleasure. and he may be a different kind of president than others, but i think that's what the people voted for. >>> the art of no deal. president trump now threatening to veto the bipartisan spending bill that already passed congress. a bill the white house, including the vice president, said he would sign. >> this bill is hardly perfect. far from it. and i'm here to tell you, folks, it is filled with one example after another that proves that when it comes to president donald trump, it's promises made and promises kept. >> let's go back to the chase. is the president going to sign the bill. the answer is yes. >> well, maybe not. >>> meanwhile, march on. hundreds of thousands of young people are arriving here in the nation's capital for tomorrow's march for o

went to margaret mitchell's apartment where she wrote "gone with the wind." and in john nichols case, i had the pleasure of having dinner with him in his hometown of taos, new mexico. apartment where she wrote "gone with the wind." whenever possible, i try to do fieldwork and visit these laces. brian: here is ayn rand, put her into perspective after we watch this. [video clip]>> i am opposed to all forms of control. i am for an absolute, laissez-faire, free, unregulated economy. i am for the separation of state and economics, just as we have separation of state and church, which led to peaceful coexistence among different religions. after a period of religious wars. the same applies to economics. if you separate the government from economics, if you do not regulate production and trade, you will have peaceful cooperation and harmony and justice among men. brian: i want to add a quote from you in the book and put it in perspective. "novelists are generally regarded as left of center," but certainly rand was not. tom: she grew up in russia when communism was developing. he

. >>> i'm peter alexander in for andrea mitchell in washington with the blockbuster breaking news on president trump's legal team. nbc news confirming that johnuptly decided to resign from his role. this coming after dowd, one of the president's outside lawyers, recently backtracked from public statements calling for special counsel robert mueller's inquiry to end saying he was speaking for himself, not for the president. and only days after president trump made a big shift in strategy with the hiring of this man, a cable news firebrand, jodi again gentleman,jo jojoe digenova. dowd's announcement coming hours before a major announcement on trade. >>> joining me now, nbc white house correspondent,

john mechancentee. a young guy who's been with the campaign since almost the very beginning. we have andrea mitchell who was in that briefing. unfortunately, we just lost andrea mitchell. almost got her. who was in the briefing with secretary of state -- outgoing secretary of state rex tillerson. chris matthews, you know what -- we got andrea mitchell back. i'm sorry, chris. >> go ahead, go ahead. >> andrea, give us your top lines from that briefing? >> reporter: well, he was fired, he was fired. precipitously. he had a terrible tenure here from the state department's perspective, not filling vacancies, cutting the budget 30% each year. but the way that he was fired and the fact that he was much closer to defense secretary mattis and in sync with european allies and others around the world in terms of a more traditional diplomacy, which arguably is a much better strategic outlook for the united states, means we're going to have big changes. they do not know whether mike pompeo, a very smart man with a much better relationship with the president, who can advocate for the state department, will speak

nbc andrea mitchell tried to save his pension. and the former cia chief johnent calling him a disgraced demagogue

harris: wess mitchell, assistant secretary of state at the state department, we appreciate your time and want to have you back whenever you can be. thank you. >> thank you, harris. >> harris: john bolton is expected to clean house at the national security council with obama holdovers reportedly on the chopping block first. this comes as bolton plans to crack down on the, quote, leakers. corey lewandowski said he hopes so and other administration officials will follow suit. >> i hope john bolton brings in a team which is on the president's agenda. if they find people leaking information, i hope they terminate those people. you cannot be in the building and leaking information about this president and expect to keep your job. >> harris: word of the day seems to be leaker. joining me now, editor in chief of "the hill" bob kusack. you have some strong thoughts about this, too. what are they? >> i think john bolton deserves his own team. if they're mcmaster holdouts or obama holdouts, they have to go. in all likelihood the leakers are probably from people who don't agree with the president. we saw that recently with the call to putin. that upset the president. understandably. now, b

nbc andrea mitchell tried to save his pension. and the former cia chief john brennon had a raid against the president calling him a disgraced demagogue who belongs in the dustbin of history. and there's this from the europeans: tax america's technology companies. amazon, facebook, twitter, alphabet. a 3% tax on revenue will be presented. it's an idea. presented this week. this is how they would take money from our digital companies. and the whole world is mad as the devil at facebook. is the company acting responsibly with the information collected on millions of users? anger does not play well on wall street. this monday morning we will open lower all across the board, especially the big names in technology. of course, how we close these days, that's something you cannot predict. i'll tell you this, though. "varney & company" is about to begin. ♪ ♪ . stuart: whoa look at this. this is what's happening to your money if you've got it in the big tech names. all of them on the downside. will you look at this? i guess it's a case of look out below. it's going to b

mitchell, he is pumped up. he had a chance to work with her. johnshe has to defend enhajessed interrogation. bring on same old argument. what did you do to keep america safe? she was there since 1985. she was part of that argument read jim mitchell's book, that is reason some americans are alive right now because of her. i look forward to her cop firmmation process. i look forward to her answers. steve: we have a sound bite from dr. mitchell who you talked to a couple hours ago. brian: i didn't provide this. it must have been taken against my will. steve: here he is talking about gina haspel. >> was operated under the direction of the presidency, with the consent of the national security agency. the attorney general approved the program and said that it wasn't torture and hundreds and hundreds of people were involved in that program in the agency. whether or not she was. i think it is not right to hold people accountable to a different set of standards than were in place at the time. that program stopped attacks, disrupted plots and saved lives. she