he pardoned weinberger when weinberger could have easily pointed the finger back at bush. >> okay. want to get jeffrey's take on your argument. >> respectfully i could not think alan is more wrong, and the simple response is watergate. i mean, under alan's theory -- let me finish, alan. let me finish. under your theory the president, since the fbi works for the president, he can tell them to do anything they want. well, in watergate, the president nixon and his -- they conspired, they made an agreement to stop the fbi investigation of watergate. was that a constitutional authority? no, it was a crime. several people went to jail, and the house judiciary committee voted to impeach president nixon over it. so, yes, he could have pardoned him but he cannot obstruct justice. >> you're saying impeachment is different than -- go ahead. >> impeachment is political. there is no judicial review of impeach. you can impeach a president for jaywalking and nobody can review that. i'm talking about was there an objestruction of justice. i have to tell you, and i wonder if you would agree with me

. >>> and now we kick off the weekend with shane weinberger who reports on -- sharon weinberger who reports on the pentagon agency, darpa. [inaudible conversations] >> good afternoon, everybody. welcome to the gaithersburg book festival. my name is mark corpsman, i'm ab state legislator from district 16. gaithersburg proudly supports the arts and humanities. we're pleased to bring you thiss fabulous event thanks in part to the generous support of our sponsors and volunteers. a few announcements. first, please silence your devices. if you're on social media today, and we sure hope you are, pleasc use the hashtag gbf. your feedback is also really valuable to us. surveys are available here at the tent and on our web site. you'll be entered into a drawing for a $100 visa gift card. our author will be signing books immediately after this presentation, and copies are on sale in the politics & prose week tent just to your right -- book tent just to your right. this is a free event, but itbo does help the book festival if you buy a book, and the more books you buy, the more books the festival sells

. >>> earlier we spoke to mark weinberger, a member of president trump's economic advisory council >> it's like a car crash you don't want to look, but you can't turn away. it is sucking a lot of the oxygen out of the air and taking the attention away from some of the folks, and the president in particular the economic team continues to move forward that same week this was happening, we had these 200 plus companies in washington. the secretary of treasury was there, speaker of the house was there, all talking about the economic agenda lots of machinery is moving the issues forward even at the same time this distraction is going on >> i didn't think it was a car crash. i thought he was stonewalling quite hard it was a shame he didn't become more forthcoming on certain elements he said i'm not about to say what the president said in privacy in case the president doesn't want to say anything about this when he's asked about his views onthis how do you think it went for mr. sessions >> washington, for investors, is creating a lot of noise. the ultimate question that u.s. investors and flo

bush pardoned weinberger at a time when weinberger might have been pointing a finger directly at bushuggested obstruction of justice. some years ago a great lawyer stood up and opposed expansion of espionage statutes to cover what hillary clinton did. he talked about the dangers of expanding statutes. that great lawyer was jeffrey toobin. he should be saying the same today about not expanding obstruction of justice to cover constitutionally authoritied presidential actions. >> respond. >> that is not what the constitution says. there is no right to obstruct justice. it is true the president can fire the director of the fbi, but that act can be evidence of a broader obstruction of justice. for example, my favorite law professor that loves hypotheticals, what if donald trump said to james comey, i am going to fire you unless you give me $100,000? is that constitutionally protected? >> are you citing one of the exceptions to it which is corrupt intent, bribery as one of the witness tampering, do you believe those are -- >> that's precisely what this investigation is about, is whether the

weinberger? can you tune in, to? >> so a little bit of it -- so, the innate -- you need to bear in mind that howard baker had recently become chief of staff. he brought with him to make risk skem, his- tommy gri longtime press aide. -- theback from berlin result of the idea of building a speech around the call to tear down the wall. we immediately, before he went on -- put a working paper, went to tom, and he said, that works. then -- this is a terrible admission. the record is what it is. the president was going to rome and the venice economic summits, so there were a lot of speeches. the whole speech writing staff worked fast to finish a whole bundle of speeches. tony dolan, chief speechwriter, one fridayl afternoon -- friday, may 16 or 15th, until he heard the helicopter descending to the south lawn. he went over to the west wing and said to the staff secretary, has aew: the president big wad of speeches, better get them to him to look over at camp david trade the staff secretary said, i will do it. as the helicop

mark weinberger from washington. jonathan, you come to us from london. jonathan: in.ter, not the only issue voters in u.k. care about. immigration and terrorism round out the top concerns. joining me for what's at stake, a cross bench peer in the house of lords and founder of cobra. he joins us from westminster. cobra, manufacturing in the u.k., most of the eu pretty much. when the u.k. wakes up friday morning, what is the optimal outcome for business? the optimal outcome for business is always certainty, and the biggest thing that brexit has caused for us in business is uncertainty, and that uncertainty is going to persist regardless of the results on thursday. of course, with the conservative party, their tax policies are much more business friendly on the whole, however we have had a prime minister who has in sending out antibusiness rhetoric and sentiment. i think this has been a wake-up call for her, this election, that she needs to be closer to business, she needs to listen to business more, and if she is prime minister on friday, i think you will have that goin

mark weinberger is plugged in to every major issue facing corporate america from doing business with aspen idea next. >>> dominating and disrupting. jeff bezos making a bold move to buy whole foods. does the world need more companies like amazon to spur global economic growth the third hour of "squawk box" begins right now ♪ >>> live from the most powerful city in the world, new york, this is "squawk box. >>> good morning, everyone welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc we are live from the nasdaq marketsite in times square i'm becky quick along with melissa lee and wilfred frost. joe and andrew are out today we've been watching the futures this morning and so far probably not much to write home about but we'll see. you saw yesterday futures were indicated up pretty sharply and gave way through most of the session where we ended near the lows of the session. this morning dow futures indicated up by about 3.5 points s&p down by just over a point. the nasdaq futures down by about 20 points. they have curbed some of the losses that we saw earlier this morning. >>> if you're taking a

. >> you know what the greatest part is, is he writes, "from our mutual friend mark weinberg i have learned" he writes. >> stephen: "as far as you are concerned of the recent george washington university student body elections. the important thing is that you cared enough to enter the arena." >> "enter the arena." >> stephen: are you ever going to re-enter the arena? >> no, no. >> stephen: come on. entertainers can be presidents. >> but, you tell me what you thin, because you did one of the most astute, super political shows for years, and that is i think trump-- it's not going to swing back-- it's not going to stay that way, meaning it's not going to open the door for nontraditional candidates. >> stephen: no, no, basically is goes competency, incompetency, competency. >> right, right. ( laughter ) it goes crazy, safe, crazy, safe. ( cheers and applause ) but clinton, bush, obama, trump. it'll swing back. some guy who is, like, governor, next year of nevada -- >> stephen: of any place. really of any place would be nice. >> do we really care at this point? >> stephen: the guy from governor'

it is much more like what president bush did when he pardoned caspar weinberger at a time when he was to go on trial and might have pointed the finger of accusation at him. no one at that time suggested that president bush should be indicted for obstruction of justice or impeached. this is selective injustice against a particular president who was unpopular with democrats. it's just not right. >> tucker: what do you think -- given your position, and given the fact that you are a law professor, presumably you know the subject pretty well, how do you respond when you see the endless hours of poorly informed legal analysis on television suggesting the opposite? >> i comfort myself by knowing that almost all of these people would be on the other side if the shoe were on the other foot. it's partisan politics. every liberal and civil libertarian ought to be against expanding obstruction of justice. it is such a vague statute. the people who want to after trump would say, if he had a corrupt motive -- what does that mean? do you really want the presidency to turn on a subjective definition

, his formersecretary matter he simply pardoned caspar weinberger, his former secretary of defence. them to stop prosecuting flynn, that would be constitutional as well. but all he did was request the director of the fbi and see if he could let it go, which is a lot softer than i command you to stop the investigation. but he would have been entitled to command him. president thomas jefferson did been entitled to command him. president thomasjefferson did that. president thomasjefferson did that. president lincoln did that. president lincoln did that. president 0bama has done a similar thing, directing an investigation begins. the idea of singling out president trump, who i do not support, i voted enthusiastically for hillary clinton, but trying to stretch existing laws to fit him, that reminds me of what stalin was told. the head of the kgb said, show me the man, and i will find you the crime. and that is just not the american way. why would the white house denied that donald trump had asked james comey to let this go if they weren't uncomfortable with that original conversation? th

bush pardoning caspar weinberger on the evening of a trial about iran-contra. dershowitz makes a powerful point here, no? >> absolutely right. i don't agree with him on all politics, on the issue of legal procedure and presidential power, he has been dead-on. in his analysis. this is someone i think everybody can respect. he is absolutely right. the president himself can direct the department of justice and the fbi. he's right about the tradition, but let's be honest, president trump is not a traditional president. he's not going it go along with all the protocols and traditions. he's going to try to get things done the way he has in business. that's why he got elected. i hope we get back to governing. he's right, the president can step right in and demand the department of justice stop t investigation. they can't miss usthoffice to start investigations based on political reasons, that has nothing to do with stopping investigations. liz: jordan, thank you so much for your time. good to see you. >> thanks, liz. liz: next up, watching the british election that co

similar to what bush did with caspar weinberger and pardoned somebody.er the constitution he has the ability to do that. at reasoning is argued, whether that is or n't, we don't have a lot of case law on that particular issue but one point i want to make clear, the fbi doesn't have the obligation to say that the president is under the investigation. the question that was not being asked or answered was whether the attorney his personal attorneys have done a target letter or have they done a formal request saying whether the president was under -- >> requesting whether yes or no. >> correct. that was not answered by his personal team. >> and on top of this, the president suggested he has tapes from james comey and the house intelligence committee wants to know by friday if these actually exist. here's a reflection from adam schiff. take a listen. >> i would certainly hope by the date that we set in our bipartisan letter the white house will respond, yes, they have tapes, yes, they will preserve them and yes they'll turn them over or that no, in fact, ther

it's what bush did to weinberger, follow that path. he has only one interest, flynn's lawyer.keep flynn out of jail. it's very tough, very uphill. the only way to do it is not on the merits because he's going to lose on the merits. it's by either making a deal or getting a pardon. >> jeff, what do you think about that? earlier, months and months ago, flynn's lawyer was talking about getting some sort of immunity and, boy, he had a story to tell. >> for once i think alan and i are going to switch places. i'm going to be the trump defender here. first of all, it's not clear to me that flynn committed any crime. false statements on a form is only a crime if you knowingly make a false statement. and it's going to be some challenge to prove that this was an intentional false statement. but putting that aside, what is the evidence that flynn can give up donald trump? give up donald trump for what? it's not clear that flynn has anything to offer the prosecutors here. so i think everybody needs to slow down and, you know, this is not -- i don't think any deals need to be made. donald

you know the young people and the photograph books that i did with lenny sinclair and barbara weinberg, barbara barefield now. it captures the essence of how the music was so absolutely prominent here in the city of detroit. it was so spread out you know there was not enough room here. you had to go further, all the way to europe and all the way in paris. you know hugh lawson, betty carter. you can go on and on with the jazz musicians and the r&b musicians. that came out of the city. i mean just absolute, we populated the music world. the music universe out there would not be complete without full discussion of the african-american musicians from out of motown. i learned the review at the apollo theater in 1962, i mean it was like whoa! i know beans bose. he wrote fingertips for stevie wonder. marvin gaye, stevie wonder, those who put together the concepts. and marvin stayed on - and so that is like the music that captures the whole spirit of the 1960s. the antiwar movement. all of the individuals had connections with the whole motown experience. >> before i ask my next question, do yo

. >>> and now we kick off the weekend with shane weinberger who reports on -- sharon weinberger who reports on the pentagon agency, darpa. [inaudible conversations]