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A New Phase in War on ISIS; Iran's Supreme Leader Tweets Plan to Wipe Out Israel; No Arrests for Low-Level Pot Users in NYC; Fort Hood Shooting Hero Tells His Story

Aired November 10, 2014 - 10:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning on this Monday morning. I'm Randi Kaye, in today for Carol Costello. Thanks so much for being with me.

President Obama is defending his decision to double the number of U.S. troops in Iraq. This weekend he told CBS News that the move is not a sign the battle against ISIS is failing but simply a quote, "new phase" in an ongoing war.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No, actually, what it signals is a new phase. First of all, let's be clear. ISIL is a threat not only to Iraq but also the region and ultimately over the long term could be a threat to the United States. This is an extreme group of the sort we haven't seen before but it also combines terrorist tactics with on-the-ground capabilities in part because they incorporated a lot of Saddam Hussein's old military commanders. And, you know, this is a threat that we are committed not only to degrade but ultimately destroy. It's going to take some time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: CNN's Barbara Starr is live at the Pentagon for us this morning with the very latest. Barbara, we should point out, of course, the President saying, again, these troops will not be involved in combat roles.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Randi. The troops will be on the ground in Iraq. There's certainly combat all around them but they're not going with the mission, with the job of conducting combat. Their major job right now is going to be trying to retrain Iraqi forces to take on the fight themselves.

That said, that's dangerous work enough in some of the areas that these new troops are going to be going to, especially Anbar Province west of Baghdad. It's an ISIS stronghold. It's been a hot spot for a lot of the latest fighting.

But they've picked spots where they want to get after ISIS and basically try and get the Iraqi forces back on the offense, back to pushing ISIS out. Not just going village by village, town by town but really trying to make some sort of significant progress on the ground at pushing ISIS back. The hope is these additional troops will be able to train the Iraqis to do that -- Randi.

KAYE: Barbara Starr, thank you very much for the update there from the Pentagon.

And the President's plans are raising eyebrows in Congress on both sides of the aisle as lawmakers question his ability to increase the number of troops without consulting them first.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. CHRIS MURPHY (D), CONNECTICUT: I do not think the President has the ability under current authority to authorize 1,500 troops without Congress acting so my hope is that when we get back we're going to have a full debate on this. And I think a lot of us are going to be very reluctant to support this kind of infusion of ground troops absent some suggestion, some evidence that the Iraqis are doing what is necessary politically to complement this major infusion of American resources.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: Here to discuss all of this, CNN political commentator and "Daily Beast" columnist Sally Kohn; and CNN political commentator and Republican strategist Ana Navarro.

All right. Sally, let me start with you here first.

I mean in a piece for "The Daily Beast" Rand Paul says this war is now in his words "illegal", I guess -- right. So what do you make of that?

SALLY KOHN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Look, as hard as it can be for me to find myself agreeing with Rand Paul and, by the way, the blatant sort of broad Obama-bashing in the piece aside -- he's right. He's right. I mean this is why we have checks and balances. This is why we have Congress. This is why we have a War Powers Act.

I saw it and folks I think know I thought it was wrong to be bombing ISIS anyway. It's going to make the situation worse not better. There is no imminent threat, which is the kind of thing that would allow you to override the War Powers Act and again people need to know there is no imminent threat from ISIS.

And so look, he should have gone to Congress then, he should go to them now. I think the real question is whether Congress, especially in Republican control, will actually support the President because they have this bad habit of opposing him, doing things that they once demanded him to do but then when he does them they still manage to oppose him. It's sort of vexing but there you have it.

KAYE: Well, Ana, I mean I want you to weigh in here because we know President Obama, he's not the first president of course to send troops into harm's way on his own authority. I mean what if anything are critics saying makes sending troops to fight ISIS different from, for example, Clinton's use of force in Serbia or George H.W. Bush's in Panama or Ronald Reagan's in Granada? What's the difference?

ANA NAVARRO, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think the difference is that every expert thinks that this is going to be a lengthy war. Most people think that it will require boots on the ground at some point. I think everybody on both sides or most people on both sides wink- wink, you know, understand that it's a real stretch to continue this particular action against ISIS under this authorization that was passed over ten years ago and that had everything to do with 9/11. That's a real stretch.

We know that we were in political crazy season right before here. We were in the midst of an election and there were things that people didn't want to do. But I think this is the time for President Obama to write up his use of authorization. John Boehner -- you know Speaker Boehner told him that in the meeting they had on Friday. Write it up, help me get the Democrat votes, you get the Democrat votes and I look forward to debating it.

I think the American public deserves the right to have this debate, to have their representatives debate this and I think he'd get it passed. I think most of the people particularly who are going to be in control now, folks like John McCain who's going to be chairman of the Senate Arms Services Committee, will help the President get this passed. But he's got to lead and he's got to put it on.

KAYE: Yes. So you don't buy the fact that even though ISIS broke from al Qaeda in 2012 that they could still lean on that and the fact that -- I mean you can't deny the fact, though, that there are former al Qaeda members who are now involved in is. Sally, why don't you take that?

KOHN: It's just too tenuous -- right. We have to bear in mind, the rationale we used even after 9/11 to authorize military action in Afghanistan and in Iraq was based on this sort of new notion of preemption, that we no longer needed an imminent threat but the possibility of preventing an imminent threat.

And in my opinion, President Obama moved the goalpost even further. He said now -- because there is no imminent threat. There is no -- currently our intelligence community confirms there's still no current planned attack. ISIS is awful. They're horrible. Nobody wants to see them succeed. But they're building a state there, they're not over here.

But he moved the goalpost. It's not even just the imminent threat, it's the possibility that they might someday threaten us becomes enough to justify military action and especially without going to Congress, this is just -- this is dangerous. This is a brave new scary world and we should be really wary of it.

KAYE: Ana, what about the money? I mean President Obama is asking for $5.6 billion to fund the fight. He's certainly getting some pushback from both sides. Will he get it?

NAVARRO: I think he ultimately will. But I think he has to make the case. And I think he has to help get the Democrat votes on that money. He's going to have to work the phones. He's going to have to work the Hill in order to get this money. And it would be easier, frankly, if he did have the use of authorized military force.

Now, you know, I disagree with Sally in that I'm not a military expert and so when my military experts, when the top military dogs in this country tell me and the top intelligence folks say, you know, that we should be there and that there is a threat and that we need to contain ISIS over there because if not they're going to come here and do harm to us here, you know, I tend to believe them. Maybe I'm naive, maybe I shouldn't but that's kind of you know, since I'm not a military expert, that's where I go.

KOHN: There are plenty of military experts saying exactly the opposite and unfortunately, a lot of the voices we're hearing from, including Senator McCain, including Lindsey Graham are people who seem to always support military action and, of course, it's disturbing that Republicans somehow seem to find the money for these things when they can't find money for food stamps and unemployment insurance and crises we actually know are happening right here.

KING: We'll leave it there. Sally Kohn, Ana Navarro -- nice to see you both.

NAVARRO: Well, let's remember, it's a Democrat president asking for that money.

KAYE: All right, thank you. She always likes to get the last word in, you know.

KOHN: She's very good at it.

KAYE: She just can't help it.

All right. Ana great -- nice to see you. Thank you.

Still to come, Iran's Supreme Leader lays out a plan for wiping out Israel and he does it in a tweet. Details straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Welcome back.

A new controversy this morning involving Iran's Supreme Leader -- it's over a tweet sent from Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's official account that lays out a plan for wiping Israel off the map and it comes days after it was revealed President Obama reached out to him in an effort to take down ISIS.

CNN chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto live in Washington following this. Jim -- good morning to you, tell me more about this tweet.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, it fits with the Supreme Leader's general combativeness towards the West with particular towards Israel. It's not the first time we heard this. You remember the previous president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who in fiery public speeches would often make this call to wipe Israel off the map.

Now the Supreme Leader in this series of tweets -- you see his picture up there now -- he had a ten-point plan that he tweeted out. This is the world we live in, right? The Supreme Leader of Iran is tweeting out a ten-point plan on this.

He takes a different tack here. Rather than saying this should be done with force or military action but it should be done with a referendum where the people in Palestine and Israel, what Iran calls the whole area, Palestine, that they would vote to see what to do with the Jewish Israelis. And, of course, his assumption being that they would vote that they get pushed out.

Listen, it's another tack trying to cloak this very combative tone towards Israel in a legal structure but it comes from the same place. And it really shows you that in Iran you have this division, right, because from the current president Hassan Rouhani, the current foreign minister Javad Zarif is currently negotiating with the U.S. over its nuclear program, you will have friendly words coming out in public. But from the Supreme Leader who truly holds the power in Iran you have a very different tack.

KAYE: And it's so interesting because on one hand he's saying he wants to arm the West Bank, places like Gaza. And then on the flip side of that he said we're not talking about massacring the Jewish people. So it's very interesting sort of what he does have to say there.

SCIUTTO: No question.

KAYE: But what does this mean, really, for the U.S./Iran relations?

SCIUTTO: Here's the thing. You have these very weighty nuclear negotiations going on right now with the deadline coming up in two weeks, in fact, two weeks from today -- November 24. There's some progress there. And it seems that both sides do want to deal. I think U.S. diplomats, the U.S. government, the administration, knows you have something of a bravado for a public audience that you will hear from the Supreme Leader that doesn't necessarily reflect the actual positions of the government.

The trouble is, it's hard to divine what the actual path will be, right? Because sometimes Iran shows more conciliatory steps, internationally at other times it shows very violently aggressive ones like its consistent position that they want Israel to end.

So the real challenge for U.S. negotiators and the administration is can they find some common ground there to move forward, for instance, on the nuclear talks, and of course, as you know there are people in Congress here, both Democrats and Republicans, our very close ally in Israel who say listen to what the Supreme Leader says -- that reflects the true Iran. There's no way you can negotiate with these people. And we're going to have a big test of that with these negotiations of the deadline coming up in a couple weeks.

KAYE: Absolutely no question. Jim Sciutto, thank you. SCIUTTO: Thank you.

KAYE: Still to come, for some New Yorkers busted with small amounts of marijuana the punishment may no longer include an arrest. Why city officials are changing the way they handle certain cases.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: New York City is making a change to the way it handles certain marijuana possession cases, and that means those incidents will no longer be treated as a crime. Alexandra Field is here to talk more about this.

All right. So this applies to what city law enforcement officials are calling low-level marijuana possession. Do we even know what low level is?

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. They haven't defined what low level is but sources tell CNN that we're going to see a change in the policy about how police officers will enforce this low-level possession.

We're going to get more of the details this afternoon during a press conference with the mayor and the police commissioner but at this point we are learning some of the details of how the policy will change.

What we understand now is that low-level possession would be treated as a violation. That means you would be given a ticket, you would be summoned to appear in court and that violation would be punishable by fine. So we're talking about no longer arresting people in some cases for this low-level violation. And when you take a look at the numbers, Randi, in the last year -- the last eight months of 2014, this city has had more than 24,000 arrests for low-level marijuana possession. So that's the number they're looking at.

KAYE: Think about how time consuming that is -- probably.

FIELD: Hugely time consuming and we know that in some of these cases you're looking at a very small amount of marijuana. Why now? Certainly this is something that we're seeing happening in various states and various cities across the country.

But we also heard from Mayor de Blasio during his campaign about working to change the policy of enforcement in New York City. During the campaign he said low level marijuana possession arrests have disastrous consequences for individuals and their families. So a lot of questions about how the policy would work in New York City, you know, versus the state. They're hoping to get those answers --

KAYE: And it also sounds like it would be up to the officer's discretion as well from what we know so far.

FIELD: Right. Certainly sounds like this is a case in which you could be given a ticket or certainly you could be arrested depending on the case. And again we haven't defined what low-level possession is so will there be, you know, sort of a number of grams, 25 grams? What will it be? How many bags? We don't know. Would it apply to whether you are smoking publicly or just possessing a small amount? All details that the administration will have to provide.

KAYE: Still a crime, maybe less of a serious crime at this point depending on what they say at that press conference, 3:00 Eastern time.

Ok. All right, Alexandra, thank you for the update.

Breaking news now into CNN. The U.S. Postal Service is reporting a massive breach to its computer system and the number of potential victims quite honestly is staggering. A U.S. official tells CNN that the personal data of nearly three million postal customers -- three million -- may have been hacked. Also hit some 750,000 current employees and retirees. The stolen information could include social security numbers, phone numbers, and addresses.

We'll have much more on that throughout the day and I'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Army Major Patrick Miller does not consider himself a hero, but the people he protected from a gunman at Fort Hood, Texas, would disagree. Miller was one of the shooting victims during last spring's rampage and he told his story to CNN's Poppy Harlow.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): A few months ago, New York native Army Major Patrick Miller and his wife Ashley were living in Texas after being assigned to Fort Hood following two previous deployments to Iraq. But on Wednesday, April 2, his life instantly changed.

ARMY MAJ. PATRICK MILLER, SHOT BY FORT HOOD GUNMAN: Sitting in the office and all of a sudden you just hear bang, bang, bang, bang, bang -- six, seven gunshots. Right away you know what that is.

HARLOW: Patrick was shot just two inches below his heart.

MILLER: After he shot me he's trying to reload so I just pushed him as hard as I could, shut the door, locked it and then I just grabbed my phone, started calling 911 on one hand, putting pressure on it with the other.

HARLOW (on camera): As you're shot, you're trying to save all these people --

MILLER: Correct, yes.

HARLOW: -- and calling 911.

MILLER: Yes, ma'am. Adrenaline is a heck of a thing. Like I said -- because honestly, and Ashley doesn't like hearing this, but I didn't know how much -- I didn't know how long I was going to live.

HARLOW (voice over): Patrick knew his chances of survival diminished each moment he waited for help to come to him so instead he went to it by climbing out of his office window.

(on camera): People call you a hero. How does that make you feel?

MILLER: I say this before but in my eyes and I've always thought this, the true heroes are the ones who never made it home. I appreciate every day, every minute of everyday and everything and everyone. That sounds so cliche but it's so true. Just don't sweat the small stuff and live your life to the fullest. Do everything you can to make a difference.

HARLOW (voice over): Poppy Harlow, CNN reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAYE: Certainly a true hero there. Thanks so much for joining me today. I'm Randi Kaye, in for Carol Costello today.

"@THIS HOUR WITH BERMAN AND MICHAELA" starts right now. Enjoy your day.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: He makes you smile, I like that.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm John Berman.

PEREIRA: He just had this beautiful grin on his face. Good morning, John Berman. Good morning to all of you at home. I'm Michaela Pereira. So glad you begin with us this hour.

We start with breaking news.