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Jerry Sandusky Victim Comes Forward; Romney Criticizes London Olympics; Interview With Former Troubled Asset Relief Program Special Inspector General Neil Barofsky

Aired July 26, 2012 - 15:00   ET

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

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: And roll the open. Top of hour number two, welcome back. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

And good thing the British do not vote in our elections, good for Mitt Romney, that is, because Romney's audition as an international statesman is off to a bit of a rough start for what he said early on today about the Olympics on the eve of the big, big event. Keep in mind opening ceremonies are tomorrow. London awoke to Romney second- guessing its security and preparation.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's hard to just know how it will turn out. There were a few things that were disconcerting, the stories about the private security firm not having enough people, the supposed strike of the immigration and custom officials. That obviously is not something which is encouraging.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Now, those words definitely got back to the prime minister there, David Cameron, with whom he met this morning. Here they are. Cameron says his country good at welcoming people, that he would absolutely make that point to Romney. So here is Mitt Romney after the meeting.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROMNEY: My experience as an Olympic organizer is that there are always a few very small things that end up going not quite right in the first day or so. Those get ironed out.

And then when the Games themselves begin and the athletes take over, all of the mistakes of the organizing community, and I made a few, all of those are overwhelmed by the many things that the athletes carry out that capture the spirit of the Games.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Fareed Zakaria, host of "FAREED ZAKARIA GPS," is good enough to join me live from New York.

Fareed, excellent to see you. You heard the sound bite, both, you know, earlier on with CNN, and after the fact, after he met with David Cameron. He's overseas, London, Poland, Israel, to bolster his foreign policy cred, but would you say he was off to a bit of a rocky start, is that fair?

FAREED ZAKARIA, CNN WORLD AFFAIRS ANALYST: I think this is probably -- we in the media are making more of this than it deserves to be made.

But I would say this, Brooke. He does seem, in general, not very well briefed on foreign policy. For example, you know, while this was a very minor issue, I think that one of the first rules, you know, when you're a kind of a visiting dignitary is you never criticize the host country for anything.

BALDWIN: This is a no-no.

ZAKARIA: And, yes, it's just an obvious thing that if somebody asks you, you say, I have full confidence in the British authorities, I'm sure they're doing their best. You don't in any way raise suspicions.

The only issue is that there is something slightly amateurish in the way in which Romney has been handling foreign policy. If you take something like Afghanistan, he criticized the president for the withdrawal, for the timeline, for the date of withdrawal. In his last speech, he comes out in favor of exactly the same date and exactly the same withdrawal.

He's criticized the president on Syria, and then when asked what he would do, he outlined something that sounded identical to what the president was doing on Syria. And as I said in that "TIME" magazine article, Republican insiders tell me they're perplexed by the fact he's not -- he doesn't have the A-team advising him.

BALDWIN: Fareed, that's precisely what I wanted to ask you about. I read your piece, "Failure to Launch."

In the second to laugh graph, you write this. "But even Republican insiders have admitted to me that he, Mitt Romney, has been strangely amateurish on foreign policy."

Do tell. What are you hearing?

ZAKARIA: I'm hearing that if you think about the obvious people in any campaign that tend to be at the senior levels of the nominee's foreign policy team will tend to be the former national security advisers, deputy secretaries of state, U.N. ambassadors, things like that, you know, people who have held very senior positions, often not the former secretary of state, because that person's kind of done it.

Romney has a few such people. He has John Bolton. But if you look at Robert Zoellick, Richard Haass, Richard Armitage, Paul Wolfowitz, none of them seem centrally involved. And what these insiders tell me is that it shows that Romney does not have the kind of senior, serious people who would tell him, for example, when you're going to London, never say anything even remotely critical of them. For example, when you go to Poland, similarly, don't make a Polish joke. When you go to Israel, these are -- you want to be as bland as possible so that the focus is just on how statesmanlike you are.

BALDWIN: Let's talk about Americans here. Let me throw up this number. NBC/"Wall Street Journal" poll, they prefer President Obama over Mitt Romney when it comes to foreign policy, but when you sort of look at the rest of the world, and I know that's your focus each and every Sunday morning, I keep thinking back, I remember the pictures in 2008.

President Obama, you know, he takes this trip abroad. You see the crowds. This was Berlin. So, clearly, the president is popular abroad, but here's what I want to know from you. So what? What does that overseas popularity do for our country?

ZAKARIA: It does something very specific.

And we shouldn't discount it. When you want governments to follow the United States to adopt a policy that we have to join a coalition, it's much easier for them to do so if America is popular, if the American president is popular.

So Nicolas Sarkozy, who was a conservative, pro-American, often described himself as a neoconservative, he was asked by George Bush and Condoleezza Rice, what can we do for you now that you have become president of France? And he said, become more popular in Europe. Be less hated, because I want to do stuff with you. I want to work with you, but I pay a huge political price for doing it.

That's why it's actually important for us to have a good image in the world, because when we want these countries to support us on some counterterrorism issue, support us on some trade issue, you want it so that being pro-American is not a political liability in France and Australia, in Germany, anywhere.

BALDWIN: Yes. Well, listening to Mitt Romney speak for about half- an-hour at the VFW annual convention in Nevada earlier this week, he was really trying to sort of take away that trust.

I remember there was a huge applause when he was talking about, you know, lack of trust when it comes to the president, for example, dealing with other nations. In terms of other nations, we know that Mitt Romney not only is going to be in London, he's going to be headed to Israel. And the president, Fareed, he still hasn't been there. And what's interesting here is that the president, he gets hammered by the Republicans here for supposedly neglecting Israel, but you point out that the president is too pro-Israel and a little hawkish.

So I'm just curious, what's the disconnect here?

ZAKARIA: Well, the point I make is, whatever we may think, if you look at the poll numbers, the president has slipped slightly from stratospheric levels, as you point out, when he entered office.

He's down to the mere 70 percent approval ratings in many of these countries. And you ask yourself, you ask these countries why, what has Obama disappointed you in, they cite two things. The first they say is that he's not balanced in his handling of Israel and Palestine, by which they mean he's too pro-Israeli, that he's not pushing the Israelis hard enough.

And the second is that he's been using drones to strike terrorist targets in Pakistan and Afghanistan. So, in other words, the two areas where Obama has lost popularity are because he's seen as too pro-Israel and too hawkish.

Now, I think most Americans would find that surprising. And I'm sure Mitt Romney doesn't want to fix that and get higher approval ratings by becoming -- by pushing Israeli even harder or by using fewer drone attacks.

BALDWIN: You say the one enemy Americans recognize and worry about remains al Qaeda. This is one, you point out, the president's strengths. And its affiliated terrorist groups, Obama has been relentless in attacking them.

And just looking to the semi-recent past, Iraq, was is not Republicans who got us in trouble there?

ZAKARIA: Yes, I think what Obama has done is he's focussed the war on terror very dramatically by saying, I don't really care about Iraq. I'm going to get us out of there as quickly as possible. I'm going to narrow the mission in Afghanistan. I don't really want to do vast nation-building in Afghanistan. What I care about is al Qaeda- affiliated terror groups and I'm going to hit those very hard. And I'm going to hit them using whatever weapons we have, whether there's special forces, drones, et cetera.

And I think most Americans are with Obama on this. They don't want the kind of vast, expansive, nation-building approach that George W. Bush pursued. So, again there, I think where Obama is, is sort of where the country is.

BALDWIN: Fareed Zakaria, always a pleasure. Again, your article is "Failure to Launch" in "TIME" magazine. Let's just remind everybody, they should be waking up on Sunday and watching you at 10:00 Eastern, "FAREED ZAKARIA GPS" right here on CNN. Fareed, thank you.

A lot more news unfolding this hour, including this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: One of the godfathers of too big to fail says break up the banks. And I'm about to talk to one of the bailout watchdogs who says those banks along with D.C. ripped off Americans. I'm Brooke Baldwin. The news is now.

(on camera): The man who served as President Bush's CIA director joins me live. I will ask Michael Hayden about leaks, drones, and what he thinks about the job performance of America's current president.

Plus, investors on edge as Facebook gets ready to announce its earnings. We're counting down until the closing bell.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: You hear about this? A surprise admission today from one of this country's super bankers. The man responsible for creating Citigroup, the world's first financial supermarket, now says the big banks need to be broken up to, get this, protect taxpayers. Listen to this for yourself.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SANDY WEILL, FORMER CITIGROUP CEO: So I think what we should probably do is go and split up investment banking from banking and have banks do something that's not going to risk the taxpayer dollars, that's not going to be too big to fail.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Amazing, right?

If this kind of stuff makes steam sort of come out of your ears, you will love my next guest here. He has written this new book. It's called "Bailout: An Inside Account of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street."

Neil Barofsky should know. He was very much so the nucleus of this whole thing. He served as the U.S. inspector general in charge of oversight for TARP, of course, TARP, Troubled Asset Relief Program, the $700 billion bank bailout.

So, Neil Barofsky, welcome, welcome to you joining me from New York.

NEIL BAROFSKY, FORMER TROUBLED ASSET RELIEF PROGRAM SPECIAL INSPECTOR GENERAL: Thank you. It's almost as if Sandy Weill read a copy of my book and suddenly saw the light.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: How fortuitous was that? The news comes out, we're talking to you.

Let's begin with that because I know your book lays out the past. If I may, I would like to begin with the present, that being big banks. Right? You're on record agreeing with Sandy Weill, chop up the big banks. But you also say the next crisis is looming. So what the heck did we learn from 2008, Neil?

BAROFSKY: From a policy perspective, we have learned nothing.

We had these giant banks, they helped cause and precipitate this devastating financial crisis in 2008. And our official government policy, led first by the Republicans and then by the Democrats, there's ultimately no difference, was to take those really big banks and make them bigger and to rescue them and preserve the status quo. And all of the bad incentives, all of the bad things that led up to 2008 are in place, which is why I would like to say Sandy Weill has come to my point of view and he's joined me and others who have been calling for the breakup of the largest banks, because you can't look at a system and look at the incentives and not realize that we're headed towards the exact same cliff that we were in 2008.

BALDWIN: But if we're headed to the exact same cliff, are we learning our lessons? Because these big banks have not, you know, been broken up. And if that happens, what's going to happen next? We're going to have Congress get together, talk, talk, talk about breaking them up, but the crisis by then has already hit, so then what?

BAROFSKY: That's why we have to act now. And this is a major issue.

BALDWIN: Who acts?

BAROFSKY: One of the reasons why I wrote this book was when I got to Washington, I was shocked when I saw the degree of control that Wall Street banks, those handful of very powerful banks, has on Washington, had on the Treasury Department and on the regulators themselves.

And this -- when you think about how all the people who are lining up, calling for, you know, legislation breaking up the banks, Glass- Steagall, size caps, and you looked how it's really changed since I first started advocating this position back when I was still special inspector general, but it's becoming a very narrowing of who's left on the island, protecting this obviously broken status quo, which you know every bank scandal today shows is still broken.

And who's left? It's really the largest banks and their biggest protectors in the world, the United States Treasury Department.

BALDWIN: Let's talk about just the good people of this country, because I know so many people, as you very well know, they have lost jobs, they have lost homes, they have lost their savings in the foreclosure crisis, and it's been this constant since 2007.

But now we have these numbers that were out just last night. This is from RealtyTrac and I just want to run through these with you. The numbers, they are staggering. You see Tampa-St. Pete during the first six months of this year, foreclosures up 47 percent over the last six months. New York, Philly, Chicago, up 20 percent.

So many people since 2007 kicked out of their homes. You know the deal. Wall Street got bailed out. That simple fact ticks off both sides, right? You have the Tea Party, they're mad. You have the Occupy folks. They're mad. Yet you have this inaction from politicians. So, Neil, who got screwed?

BAROFSKY: All the people you named are the people who got screwed.

But it's important to realize how we got there. And what I try to set forth in this book is to give people a place to channel that anger, the people who got screwed, and to understand why it happened. It's important to understand this wasn't ant accident, this was a series of choices, policy choices, because the bank bailout, TARP, which I was overseeing, wasn't just supposed to help bail out the banks.

Congress required Treasury to also make the promise to make homeowners, to help with this foreclosure crisis. And time and time again, Treasury made decisions, when dealing with the foreclosure crisis, to favor the banks over the homeowners.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Speaking of Treasury, let me just jump in. Secretary Tim Geithner actually he is getting grilled right now on Capitol Hill. He's accused of not doing enough to stop bank fraud. I just want to hear -- let's play some sound. This is from Republican Scott Garrett of New Jersey. This is what he said and then we will chat.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. SCOTT GARRETT (R), NEW JERSEY: You have been before this committee countless number of times since 2008, and if this is the crime of the century, as so many people are reporting it to be, never once did you ever come and mention it as being a problem. Never once did you come here and say, this is what you're going to do about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: So you take on Geithner and the politicians are calling foul now.

BAROFSKY: Well, it's all part of the exact same pattern.

It's almost indistinguishable from the issues that I raise in the book. Here was this mass -- you know, Timothy Geithner, as president of the New York Fed and then later as secretary of treasury, was presented evidence with what appears to be a massive global conspiracy conducted by the too big to fail banks to fix the most important interest rate in the world.

And his response was essentially to write a memo talking about structural problems to the Bank of England and telling the regulators in Washington, maybe there's some structural problems, we need to look at it, but apparently no disclosure of the fact that he knew and the New York Fed knew that there was actual manipulation of the rate going on along with allegations of a global conspiracy.

And it's far worse than just not letting Congress know. He didn't let the Department of Justice know. And even worse than that, he didn't let the markets know. And when it came time to do the bailouts, he used that LIBOR rate, this rate that apparently was being manipulated, he built it in to the bailout programs. So the taxpayer was getting less of a return, on the one hand, and on the other hand -- I think this is just as important -- he's sort of telling the entire markets, because there was some suspicion about LIBOR -- hey, don't worry about it. I'm putting the imprimatur of the United States Treasury and the Federal Reserve of the United States behind this rate.

So I actually think it's far worse than just not telling Congress.

BALDWIN: Yet -- and that's LIBOR.

Back to what you write about, not one of the Wall Street wizards, and I know this is what gets so many people hot under the collar, not one of them had to go to jail. So I want to ask you who you want to see brought to justice. We will take a break and when we come back, I will ask you to name names.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: I'm back with author of the book, it is called "Bailout: An Inside Account of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street," Neil Barofsky, also the former U.S. inspector general in charge of oversight of TARP, big bailout.

And before the break, Neil, I asked you who from the big banks, who from Wall Street should go to jail for this financial meltdown. Give me some names and what are their crimes.

(LAUGHTER)

BALDWIN: Not funny. Not funny. I'm serious.

(CROSSTALK)

BAROFSKY: No, I was a prosecutor for eight years and I ran a law enforcement agency for two years. And it would be totally inappropriate for me, without seeing the actual evidence and hearing the defenses, to declare whether or not somebody should be criminally charged.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Let me ask you this, Mr. Former Prosecutor. Were there crimes committed? Without naming names, were there crimes committed?

BAROFSKY: It certainly appears that both during the financial crisis and afterwards, there have just been a series of frauds that -- almost a list as long as my arm.

If you look at things like the robo-signing scandal, where fraudulent affidavits were routinely submitted in courts so as to illegally foreclose on people, when you look at the potential misrepresentations involving some of the more complex bonds, and certainly with this LIBOR, clearly, clearly, there needs to be handcuffs put on people who were involved in the intentional manipulation.

But part of the problem here is that, again, going back to the LIBOR issue, which you mentioned before, is that there's this deference to the banks and there's in some ways there's this fear of really using all the tools in the criminal prosecution toolkit, because these institutions, they're so big, they're so important that if you actually were to indict one and to bring criminal charges, you would risk bringing it down, and with it, the entire system.

And part of the deference that you see, and that I saw every day when I was down in Washington, when dealing with Treasury officials and how often they would put the interests of those banks before everything else, including struggling homeowners, flows from this too big to fail model, which is why we need to break these banks up.

BALDWIN: OK. We will see if that happens.

Neil Barofsky, enjoy teaching now, quite the different job at New York University, but, again, the book, "Bailout: An Inside Account of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street."

We appreciate it.

BAROFSKY: Thank you.

BALDWIN: And how about this one? A puppeteer entertaining young children and had horrible thoughts about them, described them online, and that's when the feds quickly moved in to catch this guy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: You know, some stories that I find myself reading each and every morning, they are so crazy, so bizarre, so horrible, I don't want to talk about them.

But today we have to, because this is one of those cases. You see these documents? This is from the United States district court here out of Florida. There are details on these pages that I don't care if you're a grown adult, I'm not going to read them to you, they're just that stomach-turning.

These papers were filed in the arrest of this Florida man who used puppets to entertain children, birthday parties, schools, on television. He is Ronald William Brown and he is accused of possessing child pornography and conspiring to kidnap a child.

That's not all. He allegedly told investigators he had a fantasy about kidnapping, killing, and -- eating a boy from his church. The discussions he allegedly had online go way beyond fantasy. They are grimmer than the cannibalistic hag in Hansel and Gretel. They are so graphic we can't share them with you here on TV.

Investigators say they also found child porn and a missing child flyer in Brown's home. This is a guy, keep in mind, that parents trusted enough to let their kids attend pizza parties at his house.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They're all probably passing his house every morning and every afternoon. And some parents aren't home from work yet or some of them have left from work and sending their kids on and they're not knowing at all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Not only that, but video of one of Brown's TV appearances has now surfaced online. It is strikingly creepy in light of all of this. Take a look. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RONALD WILLIAM BROWN, PUPPETEER CHARGED WITH CHILD PORN: I said (INAUDIBLE) come over here and take a look at our pictures. So I walked on over there and I took a look and do you know what it was?

What was it, Marty?

Well, it wasn't Arizona. I'll tell you that right now. They were looking at some dirty pictures and they wanted me to look, too.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: His lawyer says Brown does not have a criminal record, that there have been what the attorney calls, quoting, "some presumptions and assumptions made on what transpired," end quote.

The feds discovered Ronald Brown during a big investigation into child porn. Brown is scheduled to appear in court for a bond hearing next week.

More and more mayors across this country, today, coming out against Chick-fil-A, as the CEO says he is against same-sex marriage. We have just done some digging about the benefits of their employees.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Some mayors across the country want to keep fast food chain Chick-fil-A out of their cities and, so, they are now reacting to the COO's recent affirmation that he supports traditional marriage. Many are taking that to mean that Dan Cathy is against same-sex marriage.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAHM EMANUEL, MAYOR, CHICAGO: Chick-fil-A's values are not Chicago values. They're not respectful of our residents, our neighbors and our family members.

THOMAS MENINO, MAYOR, BOSTON: The people of Boston elect me for my thought process. I'm out there thinking about this issue. When it hurts people's rights, I'm going to stand up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: And this from the mayor of Philadelphia, quote, "So please, take a hike and your intolerance with you. There is no place for this type of hate in our great city of brotherly and sister affection."

Criminal defense attorney Kirby Clements is "On the Case" with us today. Welcome.

KIRBY CLEMENTS, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Thanks for having me.

BALDWIN: Nice to have you.

All right, so, these mayors, you know, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, I know that they can make it tough for businesses like Chick-fil-A to come to town, but is it really legal for them to say, you can't be here?

CLEMENTS: No, it's absolutely illegal. The businesses have a First Amendment right. Actually, the owners have a First Amendment right. So for the mayor to say, you have expressed a view that we disagree with, therefore you can't have a business here. Totally unconstitutional.

They can make life difficult, they can tell people not to go here, but they can't bar them from coming.

BALDWIN: OK, Kirby, so here's what we were throwing around in our morning editorial meeting and I know you did some Googling, made some phone calls, whatever it was you did to find the answer.

Because we know Dan Cathy's stance -- or we think we know his stance when it comes to traditional marriage. We were curious if this fast- food, private-entity business pays for and provides benefits for domestic partners in the company. What did you find?

CLEMENTS: Well, what I found is that in states or locales where they require businesses to provide domestic-partner benefits, Chick-fil-A does that. They comply with it.

But in areas where it's not required, they don't. They did say, however, that they don't make it a hostile environment for people who are in non-traditional relationships, but they don't provide benefits, if the law doesn't require it.

BALDWIN: OK. Case number two, let me tell you about this. This is a case. This is about a police officer in New Jersey, gets busted for allegedly misusing a motor vehicle database, not to find a suspect, but reportedly to Facebook friend a driver who caught his eye.

This is Officer Jeff Tyther's Twitter page and our affiliate KYW reports -- here it is -- that Tyther drove up to the woman while on duty in his patrol car and waved at her. He then got her plate number, used the database and then tried to friend her on Facebook.

Really, Kirby, is this OK?

CLEMENTS: This is absolutely not OK. When I was a prosecutor, when you got access to those databases, you had to sign a statement that said you would not use that information for personal purposes.

So, if it wasn't case related, you wouldn't look it up and you could lose your certification and you could be prosecuted for doing that.

BALDWIN: OK, that's what I was going to ask you. I was just going to ask you what happens to him if, in fact, he does get caught and it sounds like he has, so there you go.

CLEMENTS: There, you go. He has been caught trying to Facebook her which is even crazier.

BALDWIN: Publicly, right? That's a no-no.

CLEMENTS: Absolutely.

BALDWIN: OK, Kirby Clements, thank you so much.

CLEMENTS: Thank you.

BALDWIN: And a question for you. Are we doing enough to keep America safe? One of the many questions being asked at a conference of top security officials in Aspen.

After the break, one of those in attendance, Michael Hayden, CIA director for George W. Bush, his thoughts on everything from cyber- security to Syria and the threats against America, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Syria is in chaos. Terrorism remains a constant threat, worldwide, and warfare is increasingly being waged with computers, from hundreds, thousands of miles away.

Is the U.S., though, prepared to deal with these kinds of dangers? That is precisely what some of the most top-level national security officials and experts are discussing right now in Colorado at the Aspen Security Forum, including General Michael Hayden, the former CIA director appointed under George W. Bush, speaking there today.

General Hayden, it is a pleasure to have you on. Welcome, sir. Thank you.

GENERAL MICHAEL HAYDEN (RETIRED), FORMER CIA DIRECTOR: Thank you very much, Brooke.

BALDWIN: One of the major topics I know being discussed at the forum today is specifically cyber-security. The Senate is taking up the bipartisan Cyber-Security Act of 2012. You know this.

But some conservatives, like Arizona Senator John McCain, say this is a flawed bill. Do you side with him on that? Should it be scrapped, sir?

HAYDEN: Well, you're certainly right that it's an item of conversation here. Even as I speak, General Keith Alexander is inside the auditorium, talking about cyber-security.

The bill right now before the Senate, I think anyone who's looked at it in detail would view it to be imperfect, but those of us who worry about cyber-security don't want to make the perfect the enemy of the good.

I think there's a lot of goodness in the bill. I'm quite happy for it to be debated on the Senate floor, to have adjustments made, but I think all of us agree we need to move forward, we need to get off this center point we're on now to improve the nation's cyber-security.

BALDWIN: From cyber-security, I have to ask you about Syria. This has been going on for 17 months now. What exactly does U.S. intelligence know right now about the President Bashar al-Assad, personally, and what does that portend for whether he would actually use these chemical weapons or do something else crazy, unfathomable?

HAYDEN: Well, certainly -- first, I have to caveat my answer by reminding everyone, I'm three years out of government, so what I'm expressing are my personal views based on observation of the situation.

BALDWIN: Sure.

HAYDEN: You know, Bashar al-Assad wouldn't be president of Syria if his older brother, Basel, hadn't been killed in an automobile accident. This is someone who is, frankly, very ill prepared for the stresses of this job.

He talked reform in his first couple of years, but frankly, he didn't have the force of personality to bend the Alawite leadership to any sense of reform course.

And now we see the regime under great stress. We see his brother-in- law, Assef Shawkat, killed in that explosion in Damascus last week. I guess I'd summarize, Brooke, by saying he is badly in over his head and he doesn't know what to do, other than try to kill his way out of this situation, kill his way out of this situation against an opposition that won't go away.

And so you've got this horrific level of violence ...

BALDWIN: When we say "kill," are we talking chemical weapons? The regime earlier this week saying, no, no, we won't use this on our people. Do you buy that?

HAYDEN: I do. And, look, I could be wrong. We're talking about the future here. We're talking about what I've already identified as a weak leader, under stress. He could make a stupid decision, but this would be an incredibly stupid decision.

Right now, you've got the world on edge with an awful lot of strong arguments to intervene and, frankly, hasten what is already, I think, inevitable. If he even suggests the use of chemical weapons, if he uses them even tactically, if he loses control of them, that just motivates the global community to move more quickly and to get this thing over with.

So, it would be truly suicidal, I think, for him or his regime to do this.

BALDWIN: OK, General, I do want to ask you about these intelligence leaks and here was Mitt Romney. He definitely had some strong words about this when it came to the administration. Here he was, talking Tuesday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MITT ROMNEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And the leaks coming from the Obama White House, whoever provided classified information to the media, seeking political advantage for the administration, must be exposed, dismissed, and punished.

Exactly who in the White House betrayed these secrets? Did a superior authorize it?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: I'll caveat this for you. This is, again, your personal opinion, but General Hayden, do you believe the White House is leaking information for political gain?

HAYDEN: Well, Brooke, I'm quite happy to let the current investigation take us wherever the facts will want to lead us. And I think Governor Romney said the same thing. He asked questions. And now we've got an investigation underway that's going to find some answers to those questions.

But let me step back just a little bit because this is a perennial problem inside American intelligence and inside the American political culture.

BALDWIN: This has happened under other administrations. You know, this has happened under other administrations, multiple leaks. What's different with this particular time?

HAYDEN: Well, first of all, the story on Stuxnet, whether it's true or not, and I need to say that very clearly, does seem to taunt the Iranian administration to respond in some sort of powerful and possibly violent way.

So, you can see the harm to national security, to have that story out there. And again, you really don't have to believe it personally, if they believe it, it could be a stimulus to their taking violent action against the United States.

BALDWIN: That's the worm -- let me just -- for our viewers, that's the worm, that cyber-attack.

HAYDEN: That's right. Right.

BALDWIN: Go ahead, finish your thought, sir.

HAYDEN: Right, right. Sure.

When I was in government, very often, I would have to call an editor about a story and the opening line I would use with the editor is, look, I know we both have a responsibility in defending American security and liberty, but I fear that how you're about to go about doing that in your role is going to make it more difficult for me to perform my role.

That's the constant tension we have between a free people and secret espionage services. We're seeing it played out now, Brooke, in a way that's really quite remarkable, because, I think you'd agree, we've had a compression of these stories, haven't we, over the past six to seven months.

BALDWIN: There have been a number. And it's been Romney ...

HAYDEN: There seems to be a crescendo.

BALDWIN: Right and, as you pointed out, they're investigating, DOJ assigning two attorneys. We'll see where that goes.

I do want to ask you -- I have to ask you, General, about President Obama. I want you to think about this. We're going to take you over a break. I want you to give him a grade when it comes to foreign policy. Hold the thought. We'll be back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: We are talking with former CIA director, General Michael Hayden at the Aspen Security Forum. General Hayden, as I left you before the break here, let me show some of our most recent polling here when it comes to these candidates and foreign policy.

Fifty-three percent think President Obama would handle foreign policy better. Only 41 percent think Mitt Romney would be better. That is a 12-point margin.

General, you served briefly under this president. How do you think he's handled foreign policy, thus far?

HAYDEN: Well, Brooke, I'm going to probably disappoint you here and not answer the question for two reasons. Number one ...

BALDWIN: No, don't disappoint me.

HAYDEN: No, no. I'm a career intelligence officer. Not my job. And let me give you another reason, all right? The semester's not over, all right? We still have a lot of quizzes and exams before we get to the end of the president's term here.

BALDWIN: How about give me a highlight and "low"-light for the president.

HAYDEN: Let me give you a spotlight, all right?

BALDWIN: OK.

HAYDEN: And the spotlight is this and something that I find very heartening and satisfying both as an intelligence professional, but also as an American and that's the powerful continuity between two very different presidents, between the 43rd and the 44th presidents of the United States when it comes to the global war against al Qaeda and its affiliates.

Now, look, I understand there are differences. I've written occasional op-eds even for CNN.com on some of those differences, criticizing policies. But fundamentally these two very different men have come to the same place in how we want to go about defending America. And what's heartening for me, who kind of lived through the political turmoil for us arriving at this consensus, is that now we just about have an American answer to this challenge, not a Republican or a Democrat answer. And to me that's really remarkable and very heartening.

BALDWIN: OK. One more question. I would love an answer to this one. A couple weeks ago I spoke with a man by the name of Tom Junod. He wrote this article, this incredible cover article, "Esquire" magazine. It was called "The Lethal Presidency of Barack Obama."

And we spoke here on the show about a drone strike that killed the son of Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen. He was an American like his father. He was 16 years of age, but not a suspected terrorist.

Here was part of the interview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Do you believe that President Obama, through his control of the drone program, murdered this boy?

TOM JUNOD, WRITER, "ESQUIRE" MAGAZINE: I think that he killed him in a program that has expanded the use of killing in a reckless manner.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: General, you were CIA director when President Obama began these drone strikes. I'm going to ask a similar question to you. If he's using drones to kill American citizens without due process, is that murder?

HAYDEN: Yeah, let me, first of all, caveat this. I'm not going to comment on any specific activities, but I have watched the administration and the administration spokesmen very carefully as they talk about the legal justification for their tactics against al Qaeda.

I watched the speech that Attorney General Holder gave at Northwestern several months ago and, frankly, I was spring-loaded to criticize it, coming from the previous administration.

But I looked at it, line-by-line, and, Brooke, I would not have changed a word, a sentence or a comma. I think what the administration is doing is very consistent with the authorities of the commander-in-chief under Article II of the Constitution.

I'd add one additional thought, though. In a democracy, being legal and being effective over the long-term isn't enough. Over the long- term, democracies wage war only with the popular support of their populations.

And here, I have urged and I will urge the administration to show as much as possible without compromising necessary sources and methods of how they go about doing this, what the legal justifications are, what the processes are so that most Americans would get to a comfort level that this is hard. It's tough. I wish I lived in a world in which this was not necessary, but it's lawful, it's appropriate and it's effective.

BALDWIN: General Michael Hayden, former director of the CIA and principal at the Chertoff Group, sir, thank you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Right this very moment, Mark Zuckerberg may be in the hot seat. Facebook is really on the edge of this huge moment. The company's debut earnings report is very, very soon. This is our first peek, really, into Facebook's earnings since the company's rocky IPO back in May.

Alison Kosik is live for us. And Alison, all right, so what are investors, what is Wall Street looking for?

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: All right, so, the expectation, Brooke, is that Facebook will report revenue in the April through June quarter of about $1 billion.

Yeah, it sounds like a lot, but it's really not, considering that Facebook has 900 million users. So that means -- I know you're on Facebook, so, as an individual user, guess what? You're worth an average of a buck and change to the company.

After the bell today, Facebook will report its earnings, any time after the closing bell. But you look at how its stock has performed since it went public in May, the stock is down 25 percent and, as we wait for Facebook to report, watching shares drop more than 8 percent.

Really not seeing the optimism coming from investors as we wait on the edge of our seats for this report, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Yes, we are. A buck and some change. Alison Kosik, thank you so much.

I'm Brooke Baldwin. Thanks for being with me.

Wolf Blitzer, live in Aspen.