bush's attorney general, michael mu casy and alberto gonzalez before that. what's the difference between what republicans are doing to eric holder right now and what the democratic majority did to michael mukasey and alberto gonzalez? >> well, i -- in the house, our con term. of congress was addressed to josh bolton. i can't speak to the other cases. they never came to a vote on the senate floor. in the house, however, we did take a vote on the floor and the circumstances are quite different. we were talking about political intervention in the hiring of u.s. attorneys or having them retain their positions, the political intervention from the white house & in a very political manner. i think far be it from me to speak about this issue because our elija cummings was so very, very proud of him and the way he had conducted his role in the hearing yesterday, in a very fair way, in a very fair way, but the particulars of the cases are very different and as you know, we won our case and the court ruled in our favor, and i can only speak to our own experience in the

with michael o'hanlonnd max boot and i truly admire thank them forheonu cnib as y km smission to the record, i've done four assessments in afghanistan in 18 months and theast one fossor general mus and generalllen coidabunfimape ceow alamp and the afghan national security forces who are their counterparts and i'll just say up front that we've had much success in the security situation since we applied surge forces and inarticularly in the southhi h bun turn the momentum in the east. the frustration there is we don't have the fourth generation because of the pullout of our surge force wes had in the south and southwest. i think to be ableo achieve theame kindta hi ansf is a capable force and it's beginning to stand up to the task of taking over from the united states and nato forces. however, this are many challenges. trti ur u mis a major seecve a a st shatn political or economic side, there's been considerable less effort in a successful transition than there has been on the security side from mr. perspective. even though that was not the sety yeent o mesen in mu what is going on around the security situation. i think there are four key decisions that are facing us in the next