1 00:00:02,066 --> 00:00:04,000 JUDY WOODRUFF: At the end of another week jam-packed with news from Washington, it's 2 00:00:04,000 --> 00:00:06,033 time for Shields and Brooks. 3 00:00:06,033 --> 00:00:10,233 That's syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks. 4 00:00:10,233 --> 00:00:12,333 Welcome, gentleman. 5 00:00:12,333 --> 00:00:17,033 So, what is there to talk about, Mark, but yesterday's climate change decision, the president's 6 00:00:19,000 --> 00:00:22,800 announcement that the United States will pull out of the Paris climate accord? 7 00:00:23,533 --> 00:00:25,566 What did you make of it? 8 00:00:25,566 --> 00:00:29,066 MARK SHIELDS: In immediate impact, Judy, it probably means less in the American environment 9 00:00:32,566 --> 00:00:37,566 than the rules and regulations already repealed by his administration and by his EPA that 10 00:00:40,066 --> 00:00:44,400 were put in force, emissions controlled by President Obama. 11 00:00:44,400 --> 00:00:49,400 But, in a larger sense, it belies and reveals that president's sense about the world. 12 00:00:51,933 --> 00:00:54,833 The world is a dangerous, sinister place. 13 00:00:54,833 --> 00:00:56,366 There's conspiracies. 14 00:00:56,366 --> 00:01:00,300 Other countries are not our friends, are partners. 15 00:01:00,300 --> 00:01:01,833 Everything is transactional. 16 00:01:01,833 --> 00:01:03,833 There are no fixed values. 17 00:01:03,833 --> 00:01:08,466 We saw that, I thought most dramatically, at NATO, where the president showed an absolute 18 00:01:10,333 --> 00:01:14,033 absence of any historical understanding of American exceptionalism. 19 00:01:14,033 --> 00:01:19,033 And, as one who frankly subscribes to it that three times in the 20th century the United 20 00:01:20,966 --> 00:01:24,100 States saved the world from totalitarianism, twice in World Wars, once in the Cold War, 21 00:01:26,000 --> 00:01:30,033 and 124,965 American graves around the world in cemeteries, and 94,000 still missing. 22 00:01:33,033 --> 00:01:34,866 And I just don't understand. 23 00:01:34,866 --> 00:01:37,533 The president knows that it was for values. 24 00:01:37,533 --> 00:01:40,200 And when NATO has made mistakes, we have made mistakes. 25 00:01:40,200 --> 00:01:42,466 We have been guilty of hubris. 26 00:01:42,466 --> 00:01:46,833 But the world is a much better place because of the United States' leadership. 27 00:01:46,833 --> 00:01:51,833 And this was an example of the United States working with other nations for a common good 28 00:01:53,000 --> 00:01:54,466 to preserve our planet. 29 00:01:54,466 --> 00:01:56,633 And he just turned his back on it. 30 00:01:56,633 --> 00:01:59,233 JUDY WOODRUFF: What did you make of the president's decision and his argument for why he did it? 31 00:01:59,233 --> 00:02:00,600 DAVID BROOKS: Yes, well, I sort of agree with Mark. 32 00:02:00,600 --> 00:02:02,000 It was nice to have an American century. 33 00:02:02,000 --> 00:02:03,266 We were a superpower once. 34 00:02:03,266 --> 00:02:05,233 And now we're headed the way of Portugal. 35 00:02:05,233 --> 00:02:09,966 No, it was -- environmentally, I can't get super excited about it. 36 00:02:09,966 --> 00:02:13,766 I think it was a setback for the cause of addressing global warming. 37 00:02:13,766 --> 00:02:18,166 But, as we have heard many times, it was a voluntary agreement. 38 00:02:18,166 --> 00:02:21,933 And so this -- and we have done a very good job, because of natural gas and fracking and 39 00:02:21,933 --> 00:02:25,300 other things, of reducing emissions over the last five years or so. 40 00:02:25,300 --> 00:02:29,333 And I presume the market will still work and the emissions will still come down. 41 00:02:29,333 --> 00:02:33,666 And so we -- Donald Trump could have addressed his concerns about coal workers and stayed 42 00:02:33,666 --> 00:02:34,666 in the Paris accords. 43 00:02:34,666 --> 00:02:35,666 There is nothing block. 44 00:02:35,666 --> 00:02:37,433 It was totally voluntary. 45 00:02:37,433 --> 00:02:39,033 So this wasn't about global warming. 46 00:02:39,033 --> 00:02:41,066 This wasn't about the environment. 47 00:02:41,066 --> 00:02:45,866 This was about sticking a thumb in the eye of polite society, the elites, the globalists. 48 00:02:47,900 --> 00:02:51,866 This was a Steve Bannon-led thing designed to change America's role in the world. 49 00:02:51,866 --> 00:02:56,866 And so, to me, the effect is much worse on the global diplomacy and the idea of a world 50 00:02:58,466 --> 00:03:00,766 order than it is, at least in the short-term, about climate change. 51 00:03:00,766 --> 00:03:03,333 And the effects, I think, are ruinous. 52 00:03:03,333 --> 00:03:07,233 You can't lead the world and stick your thumb in the eye of the world. 53 00:03:07,233 --> 00:03:11,000 People -- if you act extremely selfishly to other people, they will start acting extremely 54 00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:12,433 selfishly to you. 55 00:03:12,433 --> 00:03:14,700 And that is about to happen. 56 00:03:14,700 --> 00:03:19,333 And so as the idea that America could lead the world and should influence the world and 57 00:03:19,333 --> 00:03:23,600 should have friendship with other powerful nations in the world, that's an idea that 58 00:03:23,600 --> 00:03:25,766 took a big hit this week. 59 00:03:25,766 --> 00:03:29,166 JUDY WOODRUFF: But, as we famously heard him say, yesterday, Mark, the president said, 60 00:03:29,166 --> 00:03:32,433 I'm here to represent the people of Pittsburgh, and not the people of Paris. 61 00:03:32,433 --> 00:03:37,433 MARK SHIELDS: Yes, no, it was a nice alliterative line that didn't have much relevance in reality, 62 00:03:39,300 --> 00:03:43,766 Pittsburgh having supported Hillary Clinton and basically being a green city. 63 00:03:46,600 --> 00:03:50,300 And I think it was a political statement. 64 00:03:50,300 --> 00:03:55,300 One can say, in defense of the president, I guess, he kept his word. 65 00:03:56,500 --> 00:03:58,566 He hasn't been known as a truth-teller always. 66 00:03:58,566 --> 00:04:02,400 No one has confused him with George Washington on veracity. 67 00:04:02,400 --> 00:04:07,400 But he kept his word on the Trans-Pacific treaty, trade treaty. 68 00:04:09,400 --> 00:04:12,600 He kept his word on NATO and that he was going to belittle it, or at least diminish it. 69 00:04:13,466 --> 00:04:15,700 And he kept his word here. 70 00:04:15,700 --> 00:04:18,366 And I think that was probably the strongest argument inside. 71 00:04:18,366 --> 00:04:20,400 DAVID BROOKS: Yes. 72 00:04:20,400 --> 00:04:24,366 Yes, I'm just struck by the fact that his is an administration driven solely by resentment. 73 00:04:26,433 --> 00:04:29,100 He will side with the Steve Bannon side if that position will alienate the people he 74 00:04:29,100 --> 00:04:31,200 feels resentful for. 75 00:04:31,200 --> 00:04:35,400 He will side with the regular Republican side and the budgetary, the more free market side 76 00:04:36,500 --> 00:04:38,633 if that will offend elite opinion. 77 00:04:38,633 --> 00:04:42,666 It seems to be all based on some sense of resentment, a sense of social inferiority, 78 00:04:42,666 --> 00:04:47,666 a sense of fragile ego, him just wanting to stick the eye in the people he is resenting. 79 00:04:49,666 --> 00:04:51,966 And I -- more than any other time -- we have talked about Trump not telling the truth a 80 00:04:51,966 --> 00:04:54,000 lot over the last year. 81 00:04:54,000 --> 00:04:58,733 But that global warming speech to me set new standards of just being irrelevant to the 82 00:04:59,566 --> 00:05:01,066 facts. 83 00:05:01,066 --> 00:05:03,033 We devote our lives to talking about the evidence. 84 00:05:03,033 --> 00:05:06,400 We write these wonky columns about exciting things and this and that. 85 00:05:06,400 --> 00:05:11,400 And what Donald Trump said about the Paris accord is -- just has no engagement with reality. 86 00:05:13,400 --> 00:05:15,900 The fact that somehow we're bound by this, somehow that we would be under some sort of 87 00:05:15,900 --> 00:05:20,900 legal liability if we didn't abide by the Paris accords, the fact that the Chinese are 88 00:05:22,833 --> 00:05:25,933 given permission by Paris to do this and we're not, all that has no contact reality, and 89 00:05:27,066 --> 00:05:28,000 it doesn't seem like Donald Trump knows that. 90 00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:30,066 MARK SHIELDS: He doesn't. 91 00:05:30,066 --> 00:05:31,600 DAVID BROOKS: As a number of commentators made, it doesn't seem like lying. 92 00:05:31,600 --> 00:05:35,100 It just seems like willful ignorance and disinterest. 93 00:05:35,100 --> 00:05:38,566 And we have had a lot of presidents with a lot of disagreements, but there has been an 94 00:05:38,566 --> 00:05:43,566 attachment to some sort of basic research, some basic contact with reality, which it 95 00:05:45,400 --> 00:05:48,033 seems there has just been a failure of intellectual virtue here. 96 00:05:48,033 --> 00:05:51,900 And because there is some underlying psychological issues which is he is working out, and whatever 97 00:05:51,900 --> 00:05:55,433 he needs to do that, the facts have to fit that lower reality. 98 00:05:55,433 --> 00:05:57,433 MARK SHIELDS: Yes. 99 00:05:57,433 --> 00:06:01,433 I would just add to that, Judy, what compounds it is not -- if you are on the other side 100 00:06:03,500 --> 00:06:06,333 of the argument, you are not wrong, you are not mistaken, your facts aren't incorrect. 101 00:06:06,333 --> 00:06:10,733 You are evil, you are part of a conspiracy. 102 00:06:10,733 --> 00:06:15,733 And whatever one thinks, we are all, all of us, all human beings, are passengers on this 103 00:06:18,933 --> 00:06:23,933 little spaceship of ours with very precious supplies, vulnerable supplies of air and water 104 00:06:27,033 --> 00:06:29,566 and soil. 105 00:06:29,566 --> 00:06:33,033 And, you know, any attempt to make it rational, to make it just, to help human -- make people 106 00:06:36,166 --> 00:06:40,333 more safe and secure and healthy is to be commended. 107 00:06:40,333 --> 00:06:45,333 And he's all of a sudden really did regard this as selling out the United States. 108 00:06:47,266 --> 00:06:52,133 And to cede to China the leadership in the green industry, is an abdication. 109 00:06:56,033 --> 00:07:01,033 He accused Barack Obama, and so did many Republicans, of leading from the rear. 110 00:07:02,500 --> 00:07:06,233 And this is retweeting to the rear at every possible level. 111 00:07:08,133 --> 00:07:11,633 And I just cannot overstate the NATO -- NATO brought a sustained period of peace, more 112 00:07:13,633 --> 00:07:17,833 sustained than any time since the French Revolution, to the continent of Europe. 113 00:07:17,833 --> 00:07:22,500 I mean, that is an achievement of such historical magnitude. 114 00:07:22,500 --> 00:07:23,500 And to just dismiss it. 115 00:07:23,500 --> 00:07:25,733 He is not even aware of it. 116 00:07:25,733 --> 00:07:27,800 I don't think he understands it. 117 00:07:27,800 --> 00:07:31,766 JUDY WOODRUFF: From a purely political standpoint, David, the president, one assumes he think 118 00:07:31,766 --> 00:07:33,233 this is a smart thing to do. 119 00:07:33,233 --> 00:07:35,766 I mean, is it a smart thing for him to do? 120 00:07:35,766 --> 00:07:37,433 DAVID BROOKS: I think so. 121 00:07:37,433 --> 00:07:39,533 Yes, I do think so. 122 00:07:39,533 --> 00:07:43,166 Environment has never driven political voters, I do not think. 123 00:07:43,166 --> 00:07:46,700 I can't remember a time when environmental issues really rose to that level. 124 00:07:46,700 --> 00:07:51,700 And any time you can pit the economy vs. the environment, say I'm siding with the economy, 125 00:07:53,633 --> 00:07:56,200 politically -- again, not on the merits, not what I think of it -- I think it is probably 126 00:07:56,200 --> 00:07:58,600 a winning issue. 127 00:07:58,600 --> 00:08:02,200 Then, finally, just remember, this is an administration who is polling and whose interest is focused 128 00:08:02,933 --> 00:08:05,966 on about 12 states. 129 00:08:05,966 --> 00:08:08,000 And that's a lot of coal country. 130 00:08:08,000 --> 00:08:13,000 And so if people in that part of the world, with some justice, some minor justice, see 131 00:08:15,300 --> 00:08:18,166 Donald Trump as their savior against the elites in Paris, then, politically -- taking aside 132 00:08:18,166 --> 00:08:20,800 the merits, politically, I think it is probably a good move for him. 133 00:08:20,800 --> 00:08:22,833 JUDY WOODRUFF: Do you agree it's winning politically? 134 00:08:22,833 --> 00:08:25,933 MARK SHIELDS: Well, I thought Governor Jerry Brown made a case last night in his interview 135 00:08:25,933 --> 00:08:30,933 with you, pointed out that California has the toughest, greenest standards of the country, 136 00:08:32,833 --> 00:08:37,566 far more draconian by Trump's standard, measure, than anything, environmentally. 137 00:08:39,500 --> 00:08:43,433 Two million new jobs, a gross domestic product grown 40 percent fastest than the nation, 138 00:08:46,133 --> 00:08:50,500 in spite of, because of the greenness. 139 00:08:50,500 --> 00:08:54,266 So, I think a case can be made. 140 00:08:54,266 --> 00:08:56,400 But I just think -- I don't know. 141 00:08:56,400 --> 00:09:00,900 I just think there is a limit to the isolation and this sort of -- this defensive paranoid, 142 00:09:02,466 --> 00:09:04,733 whatever you call it, nationalism. 143 00:09:04,733 --> 00:09:06,833 It isn't even nationalism. 144 00:09:06,833 --> 00:09:11,533 It is just sort of everybody, all strangers, they are all -- you know, they are all bad. 145 00:09:12,266 --> 00:09:13,400 They wish us no well. 146 00:09:13,400 --> 00:09:14,900 JUDY WOODRUFF: An us vs. them. 147 00:09:14,900 --> 00:09:16,966 MARK SHIELDS: On every matter. 148 00:09:16,966 --> 00:09:20,733 DAVID BROOKS: Yes, but do you notice how what used to be substantive disagreements turn 149 00:09:20,733 --> 00:09:21,933 into cultural wars? 150 00:09:21,933 --> 00:09:24,000 It's like the gun issue. 151 00:09:24,000 --> 00:09:27,433 It used to be the gun issue, gun control was about which kind of guns we should have floating 152 00:09:27,433 --> 00:09:28,666 around in our society. 153 00:09:28,666 --> 00:09:31,366 But then it became rural vs. urban. 154 00:09:31,366 --> 00:09:33,966 And the substance didn't actually matter that much. 155 00:09:33,966 --> 00:09:38,433 And one has the sense with global warming it's a not about substance anymore. 156 00:09:38,433 --> 00:09:42,466 It is about what culture -- in our cultural divide, which culture are you on? 157 00:09:42,466 --> 00:09:45,966 And so he aligned with one culture, a rural culture, which is his base. 158 00:09:45,966 --> 00:09:50,433 And that is why I think, from his point of view, it solidifies that, which he needs to 159 00:09:50,433 --> 00:09:52,533 survive. 160 00:09:52,533 --> 00:09:54,566 JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, it seems like a long time ago, but it was just -- really just really 161 00:09:54,566 --> 00:09:58,900 a couple of days ago, Mark, that we were hearing reports about the White House in disarray, 162 00:10:00,900 --> 00:10:04,733 the president planning to fire or rearrange - - fire people, rearrange the staff in an 163 00:10:06,833 --> 00:10:11,500 attempt to get beyond the focus on the Russia investigation, everything else. 164 00:10:11,500 --> 00:10:16,500 You couple that with the Paris announcement, do you see this White House in any sense getting 165 00:10:18,700 --> 00:10:23,700 beyond, getting its hands around the dysfunction that appears to be gripping... 166 00:10:25,866 --> 00:10:27,733 MARK SHIELDS: I really don't. 167 00:10:27,733 --> 00:10:30,300 I really don't, Judy. 168 00:10:30,300 --> 00:10:33,966 I mean, just imagine yourself, you are Reince Priebus, you are the chief of staff, and complained 169 00:10:36,000 --> 00:10:39,600 to a friend, look, said he hadn't been able to spend time with his children for the past 170 00:10:40,733 --> 00:10:42,000 four months. 171 00:10:42,000 --> 00:10:44,566 And what does he read every day in the paper? 172 00:10:44,566 --> 00:10:47,400 The president called him Reincy, refers to him as Reincy. 173 00:10:47,400 --> 00:10:48,700 He's going to be ambassador to Greece. 174 00:10:48,700 --> 00:10:50,033 They are going to get him out. 175 00:10:50,033 --> 00:10:51,033 They're going to replace him. 176 00:10:51,033 --> 00:10:53,100 Who is going to replace him? 177 00:10:53,100 --> 00:10:57,133 You can't be thrive, you can't be productive in that kind of an environment, where you 178 00:10:57,133 --> 00:11:01,333 are looking over your shoulder at who is conspiring over here and what faction? 179 00:11:01,333 --> 00:11:03,966 Are you Kushner or are you Bannon? 180 00:11:03,966 --> 00:11:08,966 And it just -- Judy, they work long hours, they work hard, and they're uncertain. 181 00:11:10,666 --> 00:11:12,500 They're being sniped at. 182 00:11:12,500 --> 00:11:14,866 There is no appreciation, there's no sense of shared mission. 183 00:11:14,866 --> 00:11:17,800 And the reward is when you tell the president what he wants to hear. 184 00:11:17,800 --> 00:11:22,800 It's the antithesis of Jim Baker and Ronald Reagan, where a president was secure enough 185 00:11:24,833 --> 00:11:28,800 and confident enough to ask a chief of staff for advice that he didn't want to hear, that 186 00:11:29,666 --> 00:11:31,600 was tough. 187 00:11:31,600 --> 00:11:33,600 JUDY WOODRUFF: Does all this matter, David, quickly or inside baseball? 188 00:11:33,600 --> 00:11:36,166 DAVID BROOKS: Well, it matters if we don't have an effective administration. 189 00:11:36,166 --> 00:11:40,766 Reince Priebus has the ultimate job security right now, because nobody else wants the job, 190 00:11:40,766 --> 00:11:43,033 so they can't get rid of him, because somebody has got to do it. 191 00:11:43,033 --> 00:11:48,033 But I do think it makes the prospect of a functional White House very remote, because 192 00:11:49,466 --> 00:11:51,000 you can't get new people because they don't want it. 193 00:11:51,000 --> 00:11:53,466 The current people are in some sort of war with each other. 194 00:11:53,466 --> 00:11:56,066 And every time we hear about something internal, whether it was the decision-making over global 195 00:11:56,066 --> 00:12:00,633 warming, or the shambolic attempt to get an FBI director, it just sounds like disorganization. 196 00:12:00,633 --> 00:12:05,600 JUDY WOODRUFF: And more reports tonight about investigations with the Mueller probe. 197 00:12:06,700 --> 00:12:08,466 David Brooks, Mark Shields, thank you both.