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Deadly 7.3 Magnitude Earthquake Hits Nepal; NFL Suspends Tom Brady Over Deflategate; White House Calls Bin Laden Raid Report 'Baseless'; NSA Chief: ISIS Message Resonating in U.S.; Will Officer Be Charged in Tony Robinson Death? Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired May 12, 2015 - 06:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Unprecedented penalties.

[05:59:11] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Suspended for four games without pay.

DEVIN MCCOURTY, PATRIOTS: We have full belief and faith in our quarterback.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Someone's breaking rules, you got to get punished for them.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: This video from a friend pro-ISIS hacking group threatening a cyber-attack is coming.

PHIL MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: This is about the first time in about a decade that I personally have been concerned about the fight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The shooting death of unarmed teen Tony Robinson.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He was a good, kindhearted kid. He was very happy and just wanted to be accepted.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Will the Madison police officer be charged?

JEB BUSH, FORMER GOVERNOR OF FLORIDA: I'm a proud brother of George W. Bush.

MEGYN KELLY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: On the subject of Iraq.

BUSH: Yes.

KELLY: Would you have authorized the invasion?

BUSH: I would have. And so would have Hillary Clinton.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota and Michaela Pereira.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It's Tuesday, May 12, 6 a.m. in the east. And we do begin with breaking news.

Another major earthquake hitting Nepal near Mt. Everest and the China border. This is the moment the 7.3 quake started shaking what's left of that city and surrounding areas.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: So you can see first images of chaos and confusion in the streets. This comes, of course, as Nepal is still recovering from the other devastating earthquake that killed more than 8,000 people just two weeks ago.

Let's get right to CNN senior international correspondent Ivan Watson in Hong Kong. What do we know, Ivan?

IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Chris and Alisyn, good morning.

It's a tough day for Nepal, coming so soon after that previous terrible natural disaster. Everybody we've talked to said there were frightening moments after the 7.3 magnitude earthquake hit a little bit less than three hours ago.

Our own producer outside of Kathmandu, he was cleaning up debris from the previous earthquake when this earthquake hit. And he said he witnessed in front of him about seven houses collapsing in front of him and two people who were caught in the debris and, fortunately, freed from the rubble. Fortunately, he's not hurt either.

However, the International Organization for Migration is reporting at least four people dead east of Kathmandu. We're still trying to get a sense of the scale of the damage, the scale of the potential casualties.

But this is going to be very, very frightening for people who were completely emotionally and psychologically traumatized by the disaster that struck this impoverished country a little bit less than three weeks ago that made so many people homeless. And they will likely be sleeping out in the open again tonight as, unfortunately, the monsoon season approaches, and aftershocks continue to shake this mountainous country -- Chris and Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Oh, just so much trouble, Ivan. They have not recovered in any stretch from that original one. Thanks so much for the update. We'll check back in with you.

Now to another top story we're covering. The NFL coming down on Tom Brady and the New England Patriots over Deflategate. Brady's agent is blasting the league punishment and saying the Super Bowl MVP will appeal.

CNN's John Berman is here with more of the story.

Good morning, John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Alisyn.

You know, the NFL guidelines has punishment for altering a football, $25,000, but Tom Brady's general awareness that Patriots employees likely took air out of the football was so egregious, says the NFL, and his cover-up so egregious it merits a punishment the likes of which the NFL and its players have never seen before.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN (voice-over): The unprecedented penalties, including a four- game suspension for Tom Brady came less than a week after the bombshell 243-page report on Deflategate.

TOM BRADY, QUARTERBACK, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS: I don't have really any reaction. I haven't had much time to digest it really.

BERMAN: Players throughout the league are reacting to the punishment.

MCCOURTY: We have full belief and faith in our quarterback and Tom. And it's been like that for me for six years. And that's not going to change now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Someone's breaking rules, I understand, you know, you're going to get punished for it.

BERMAN: The report led the league to not only bench the star quarterback but also slap the Patriots with a $1 million fine, the highest ever. And in another staggering blow, the team has to give up it's 2016 first-round draft pick and fourth-round pick in 2017.

DREW ROSENHAUS, SPORTS AGENT: The NFL is on a mission right now to repair some of the mistakes that they've made in the past. The NFL league office on this one out of control.

BERMAN: Brady's agent is blasting the decision saying in a statement, "We will appeal" and that "the discipline is ridiculous and has no legitimate basis."

New England fans are showing their support online and beyond. There's a hashtag #NoBradyNoBanner, pressing the NFL to wait to raise the championship banner until Brady is back on the field.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't want to see a banner without Brady. He's been the franchise.

BERMAN: The Patriots owner is also sticking by his player, stating, "Tom Brady has our unconditional support. Our belief in him has not wavered."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: Now, the league said that history does matter here. One of the reasons for this harsh unprecedented punishment, well, the Patriots have a history of bending or breaking the rules before. Of course, 2007 with Spygate.

But if you are looking for a consistent thread in the severity of punishment issued by the NFL, well, you're going to be looking for a while -- Chris. CUOMO: Your objectivity stunning, given the circumstances of your

fandom, John Berman.

Joining us now, Christine Brennan, CNN sports analyst and columnist for "USA Today," and Mr. Coy Wire, CNN's sports correspondent and nine-year NFL veteran.

And I say this with not a trickle of sarcasm. I hope you two are happy now. Christine Brennan, do you like this punishment that was handed down? Do you see some precedent or consistency or promise in it?

[06:05:02] CHRISTINE BRENNAN, CNN SPORTS ANALYST: Chris, I do like it. I like it a lot. I think the bottom line is it's not only Tom Brady cheating; it's also the lack of cooperation.

To me Brady really made a big mistake. If he's innocent, he needed to turn over those text messages, the cell-phone records. His lawyer could have looked at them and gone through them. This was not just giving away the phone. They would have had -- they had unprecedented -- an agreement to be able to look at specific messages that Brady and his agent could have picked for the NFL. He blew it. If he's innocent, you've got to do that. He didn't do it.

So it's the lack of cooperation, as we said, Chris, as well as the cheating. And I think it's consistent with what the NFL -- the new NFL post Ray Rice.

CUOMO: Coy Wire, you said, "Hey, man, you got rules. You break the rules, you have to pay."

Can you find any precedent in league history where something like this has been punished this way? Ordinarily $25,000 fine, and here you've got a guy, four games, million dollars for the organization. Two different draft picks.

COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: This is the greatest and largest fine in the history of the NFL, $1 million for the organization. If you look at the -- what they did, they actually took Spygate and just bumped it up a bit. And I think they did that, because this is the second offense for the same organization. It was disbursed differently, but with Spygate it was $750,000 and loss of a first round pick.

With this you're looking at $1 million for the organization, a first and a fourth-round pick. Then you have the individual case and scenario with Tom Brady and his -- his suspension and his fine.

And I think when you look at this, it's warranted. You have an instance where we know the league does not like to be lied to. Goodell does not like to be lied to.

But the other thing that I think is lost in this is that this was not Goodell who came up with these punishments. This was a former player, a 15-year NFL veteran.

CUOMO: Troy Vincent.

WIRE: A five-time pro-bowler, Troy Vincent. Former first-round pick. Walter Payton Man of the Year Award, Whizzer White Man of the Year Award. And one of the men who has the most integrity -- a man of great integrity and character, one of the best that I've ever personally met. Yes, he does work for the NFL now. But I don't think that he would compromise his own integrity. I think that...

CUOMO: Although he did get beat up a little bit with one of the earlier domestic abuse scandals. People came at him a little bit for what he was doing in that respect.

But I hear you on it. I know he's got a great reputation, and he's the right person to put this on.

But, you know, Christine, so what does this mean for the league now in terms of what it does with these types of infractions? Because, yes, Coy's right and everybody else who's pushing ethics in the situation. A rule is a rule. But rules are enforced different ways. You know, your toe is on the line, that's five yards. Grab me by the face mask and throw me to the ground, it's 15. You know, many will argue this was not this serious of an infraction. But what do you see in it that makes you like it?

BRENNAN: I like the fact that the NFL has a get-tough policy, Chris. I think that -- that the bottom line is if you are thinking of cheating and you're an NFL player, you're going to think again. If anyone else is pulling any fast ones, they're not going to do this again.

I think that we really do need to look at the NFL post-September 8. And frankly, our whole country and our culture in terms of domestic violence. This is not domestic violence; it's different. But it's to the integrity of the game. And I think the NFL is very serious about this.

And it is a workplace issue. That's another important point. If you or I were in a situation where we were cheating or caught cheating in our workplace, we better cooperate. And so, yes, it's an unusual workplace because it's a football field. It's a practice field; it's a game.

But it is the workplace, and the NFL has to look at that and be very serious about that moving forward. And I think that's what we're seeing. It's unequivocal, and no one can have any questions going forward about what the National Football League is going to do.

CUOMO: The old adage of it's not the crime, the cover-up seeping from politics into football and coming to bite Tom Brady in the footballs.

Coy Wire, let me ask you this, though. What happens with the next infraction? So let's say somebody gets caught using PEDs in the preseason and -- or somebody punches somebody in the face during practice. You know, where -- now don't you have a precedent? If you got four games for the balls, if you grab me and toss me a beating in practice, well, now what do you do? They've set a bar for themselves, haven't they?

WIRE: It's a great question. And I think when you look at -- with the PEDs, you're talking about the drug policy. When you're talking about the official playing rules, you mentioned some of the penalties, and those situations. That's different than what this was. This was a hit against the NFL's policy on integrity of the game and enforcement of competitive rule.

CUOMO: So you're saying don't get distracted by the balls. This is about how they handled the situation that's being punished?

WIRE: That's exactly right. And I think that's -- and they were clear that they -- although they can't determine how much this would affect the outcome of a game, it is a rule for a specific reason that it provides a competitive advantage.

And I know that it says $25,000 is the fine for deflated footballs, but that's the minimum. It says at least, a minimum of $25,000. So we haven't had this situation. This was very unique.

[06:10:03] I think when you add up all of the components: that this was a second offense. It's the same organization. And that Tom Brady was unwilling to cooperate as players and even Goodell himself had been willing in other cases -- Richie Incognito, the cell phones were turned over. That I think played a huge factor into this severity of the punishments that were dealt out.

CUOMO: Coy Wire, Christine Brennan, you beat me on the facts; you beat me on the lawyering; you beat me on the policy. And hopefully, the league and all the fans accept this as a step in the right direction. Certainly up in New England, it's going to be met with some frosty feelings, but that's only to be expected.

Thanks to both of you. We'll see what happens next.

BRENNAN: Thank you.

CUOMO: Mick.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, the Obama administration is firing back at veteran investigative journalist Seymour Harsh -- Hersh, rather, denying his claims that the raid that killed Osama bin Laden was staged. A White House official calling Hersh's bombshell article baseless, insisting there are too many inaccuracies to fact- check them all.

CNN White House correspondent Michelle Kosinski has the very latest for us this morning. Quite a development overnight and quite a conversation, I'm sure, they're having right now.

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Michaela, you're right. And the White House did come out singing, saying that the notion that this operation to kill Osama bin Laden was anything but a unilateral U.S. mission is patently false. Here's the press secretary.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The Obama White House is not the only one to observe that the story is riddled with inaccuracies and outright falsehoods. The former deputy director of the CIA, Mike Morell, has said that every sentence was wrong.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSINSKI: So what in there could be true? What about this possibility that somebody -- somebody within Pakistani intelligence knew that Osama bin Laden was at least in Pakistan? Well, even the former CIA director and secretary of state have long said that, yes, that could be true.

What about this assertion, as Hersh says, somebody within Pakistani intelligence one day just walked into the U.S. embassy and said, "Oh, I know where he is"? CNN sources aren't ruling out that at some point somebody walked in and did give some kind of information that may have been helpful. But they insist it was not one person or one piece of evidence that cracked open this case -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Michelle, thanks so much for that. We'll talk about it much more in the program.

Meanwhile, a stern warning from the director of the NSA: ISIS is increasing its already successful efforts to spread its message on social media, and it's apparently resonating with more Americans. CNN's senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh has more for us -- Nick.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, this morning, Stark, after the Garland, Texas, shootings were claimed both by ISIS but beforehand the shooters pledged their allegiance to ISIS's leader here is what director Michael Rogers of the NSA had to say about the threat that the Internet and ISIS together pose.

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ADMIRAL MICHAEL ROGERS, DIRECTOR, NSA: This concern about individuals within the United States increasingly resonated, if you will, with the ideology of ISIL, and the idea of just acting violently indiscriminately is clearly of great concern.

It's a trend that things would suggest is increasing, not decreasing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALSH: There's one key issue about ISIS, that necessarily you don't have to have these attackers speaking to ISIS leadership. They can simply be inspired and act independently, the lone wolf, if you like.

I should point out that Mike Rogers is talking in a climate in which the NSA will be looking to renew its broad surveillance powers simply in the weeks ahead. That may be feeding into some of the sense of urgency in his comments. And also, too, he spoke on a day in which, like we often see another video emerged online in which ISIS supporters claim they have plenty of hacking attacks ready to jeopardize the U.S. No evidence of their entire success so far, but a climate of concern building here.

CUOMO: Well, certainly, Nick, the surprise of social media effectiveness in spreading their message is certainly catching people off-guard. The question is what to do with it. Thank you for the reporting this morning.

Another big headline for you: the U.S. and Russia face-to-face today. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet to try and find a political solution to the conflict in Syria.

Now, right now Kerry's meeting with his Russian counterpart. That would be foreign minister Sergei Lavrov. Now, they just laid a wreath at the World War II memorial in Sochi. The meetings between Putin and Kerry are also expected to tackle the crises in Ukraine and Yemen as well as the Iran nuclear talks. A lot on the plate there.

Kerry's trip is the first cabinet-level visit to Russia since start of the Ukraine crisis, which is still dividing that country right now.

PEREIRA: The family of Tony Robinson will find out this afternoon whether the police officer who shot and killed their unarmed son will be charged. This case sparked emotional protests in Madison, Wisconsin. Now the D.A. is set to announce a decision after an independent two-month investigation.

CNN national reporter Ryan Young is live from Madison this morning on what we can expect.

Hey, Ryan.

[06:15:08] RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Michaela.

Of course, Tony Robinson was killed back in March. And a lot of people had questions since then.

That is actually the porch where the officer and the initial encounter with Tony Robinson happened. The officer, Matt Kinney, says that he arrived here to the scene after reports that someone was hitting people randomly in the street and operating -- trying to run between cars.

All of a sudden there was a pushing match, a fight. The officer said he was hit in the head, pulled his gun and fired shots.

Now this investigation should move forward and tell us today whether or not those charges will come forward. Let me tell you, we were here for the passionate response when people hit the streets they were protesting. We watched that as it happened.

People in this community want to know what will happen next. And they want to know whether or not charges will be filed against that officer. Now, the family told us months ago that they believe in the process -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Ryan, thanks so much for that.

Well, 911 calls expected to be released today following the latest shooting incident involving George Zimmerman. The 31-year-old suffered minor injuries after being shot at by a man in Florida on Monday in what's being called a case of road rage. Zimmerman and the suspect apparently involved in an ongoing dispute.

Zimmerman, you'll remember, was acquitted in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin in February of 2012.

CUOMO: So?

PEREIRA: Trouble seems to find him.

CAMEROTA: Right.

CUOMO: Well, is that it? Or does he find the trouble?

CAMEROTA: That's the question.

CUOMO: I don't know. I just asked it. What do you think?

PEREIRA: Let me put it this way. He and trouble seem to dance a lot.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CUOMO: I think that it's more than a coincidence at this point. Obviously, you know, we interviewed him about his feelings about why this happens. He feels persecuted. He feels highly victimized by what happened with Trayvon Martin. He feels that people are still after him. He can't work. He can't take care of his family.

PEREIRA: To be fair this incident is related to a road rage incident last fall. It's the same person.

CUOMO: Well, he's had an ongoing feud, supposedly.

PEREIRA: An ongoing feud, yes.

CAMEROTA: Does he always escalate? Does he have anger management issues? I mean, that's one question.

PEREIRA: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Or does trouble just follow him?

CUOMO: Well, I think that the chance he has no responsibility for these is very small.

CAMEROTA: Let us know what you think about all that.

CUOMO: All right. Another story this morning, crews desperately trying to find survivors after more than 70 tornadoes ripped through the heartland. We do know at least five people have lost their lives, including this Arkansas couple. Their bodies were found next to their baby daughter. Miraculously, she survived, along with three others originally presumed dead.

Let's get right to meteorologist Chad Myers. It's all about advance warning and people being able to simply get lucky in some of these situations. What do we see now, Chad?

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: You bet. Today is a good day. It is a decent day in the plains. There'll be a couple showers and storms around south Texas and even the East Coast, but it gets bad again tomorrow. And Saturday and Sunday look just like big tornadoes through the plains.

Again, we're back in this pattern. Even tomorrow afternoon, look at this. This is Wednesday afternoon. Showers, storms in Texas. And then big weather all the way through Texas, Oklahoma into Kansas. That's Wednesday. It takes a break on Thursday. Takes a break on Friday.

Now, it's still going to rain a lot. We're still going to see six to ten inches of rainfall where they kind of need rain. But the setup for the weekend is really getting extreme. Grand Island, Wichita, Oklahoma City, down into Dallas and all the way down to Del Rio, Texas, that is the bogey. That's the bulls-eye for severe weather this weekend.

Back to waking up in the east 89 degrees today in New York City, 67 tomorrow and 73. Very pleasant for your end of the week and into the weekend.

CAMEROTA: Eight-nine degrees?

MYERS: I know. That's hot.

CAMEROTA: Yowza. Wow. All right, Chad, thanks so much for all of that.

Well, it was considered President Obama's finest hour in office, the killing of Osama bin Laden. Now the White House fighting back against a report claiming that raid was a big lie. We're digging deeper with our experts.

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[06:23:05] ROBERT O'NEILL, FORMER U.S. NAVY SEAL: I'm sure that my friends got shot at and almost took a few bullets in the face through the doors would disagree with the man and be a little bit insulted that he would suggest that, especially because he's never really risked his life for anything. All he does is, you know, have bad sources and then prints garbage.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: All right. Well, that was former U.S. Navy SEAL Robert O'Neill, dismissing a new report by legendary journalist Seymour Hersh, who claims the bin Laden raid was very different than the story the White House has always told.

Let's get right to it with Phil Mudd. He's our CNN counterterrorism analyst and former CIA counterterrorism official. And Daveed Gartenstein-Ross. He's a counterterrorism analyst and senior fellow for the Foundation of Defense of Democracies. Gentlemen, thanks so much for being here to try to parse what's going on with Seymour Hersh's writing.

As you know, let me start with you, Phil, Seymour Hersh disputes what Rob O'Neill, one of the SEAL Team 6 says. Let me read to you from his report, from Hersh's report. He says the SEAL Squad used explosives to blow the doors open without injuring anyone. One of bin Laden's wives was screaming hysterically and a bullet, perhaps a stray round, struck her knee. Aside from those that hit bin Laden, no other shots were fired. Who are we to believe, Phil?

MUDD: I've got to stop laughing for a moment. I support this article, by the way. And I'm going to shock you, because as a national security guy, we get no humor in my life. This is the funniest thing I've seen in maybe five years.

I wake up yesterday morning and see this thing, and I can't figure out -- there's nothing here that's even close to true. I mean, if Tom Clancy wrote this, he'd be laughed off the street.

This just -- this suggests that the White House, Navy SEALs, the Pentagon, the CIA, Saudi princes and Pakistani generals somehow got together in a room and decided that they could come up with the best conspiracy man has ever known.

I wouldn't paper a bird cage with this stuff. This is just fiction. I don't know where this comes from.

CAMEROTA: Daveed, do you see it as implausibly as Phil does?

[06:25:03] DAVEED GARTENSTEIN-ROSS, FOUNDATION FOR THE DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES: Absolutely. Although I do think that you could paper a bird cage with fiction.

CAMEROTA: OK, OK. Hold on a second. So you -- you both dismiss the idea that there was no fire fight.

There's more. Let me read to you more. And this comes into play whether or not Pakistan knew all along where bin Laden was. And some people say that that's not so much of a stretch.

Here's what Seymour Hersh reports on that: "Bin Laden had been a prisoner of the ISI," meaning Pakistan CIA, "at the Abbottabad compound" -- stop laughing, Phil, while I read this -- "at the Abbottabad compound since 2006, that two senior Pakistani military leaders knew of the raid in advance and had made sure that the two helicopters delivering the SEALs to Abbottabad could cross Pakistani air space without triggering any alarms" -- Phil. MUDD: Well, let's be clear here. To be serious for just one second.

The assertion is not that somebody down the chain in the Pakistani military or security services might have known something. The assertion is that senior Pakistani generals, including the head of the security service, knew for years.

So while that security service was losing officers in the fight against al Qaeda, they are also at the same time secretly sheltering the head of al Qaeda.

Let me break some news for you this morning. Aliens abducted President Obama 15 minutes ago, and Darth Vader's in the Oval Office making decisions for the United States. I have a secret source who told me that. Why don't we publish? This is nonsense. This is just ridiculous.

CAMEROTA: Daveed, is it nonsense? Because people always questioned how bin Laden could have been so close to a Pakistan military base without anybody ever detecting him.

GARTENSTEIN-ROSS: Well, of course people question that, including the then-director of the CIA, Leon Panetta, who went on to be secretary of defense. Questioning the idea that there wasn't Pakistani knowledge that may have gone higher up the chain isn't exactly revolutionary, given that cabinet members were questioning it.

But let me get to what the problem is with this story. There might be individual pieces that are true. And NBC News, for example, published kind of a rushed story which suggested that there may have actually been a source other than the U.S. just tracing down this courier. But the problem with the story...

CAMEROTA: OK, but hold on. Let me tell you that, because that's what Seymour Hersh says, that there was actually this Pakistani source.

GARTENSTEIN-ROSS: Correct.

CAMEROTA: A former military person, who walked into the embassy and gave up bin Laden's whereabouts.

GARTENSTEIN-ROSS: Correct. And NBC has a somewhat similar story, although it seems like they rushed to put it out in light of the Seymour Hersh story.

But look, the overall problem with the Hersh story isn't that there might -- isn't that none of the components are true. There may be some true components that are true in different ways. And Phil and I may disagree on which ones are more plausible. But the problem is it is a comprehensive alternative history that's based on sources that are anonymous. And if you look at how he describes the anonymous sources, it's clear that they didn't actually have direct knowledge of the events.

For example, one source is described as a senior official who had information about the intelligence leading up to the raid, not about the raid itself. And then there's two consultants to soak on. And those consultants wouldn't have the kind of information to provide the kind of omniscience that he gives to the sources within the story.

Overall, if CNN were considering a story like this, it would not pass fact-checking muster with CNN. The overall tableau is one of fiction. There may be some facts embedded within it, but he is presenting what he says is alternative definitive history, and it's impossible to take that alternative history seriously.

CAMEROTA: Phil, very quickly, before we let you go, I want to talk about developing story out of the NSA. The NSA director said yesterday that he believes that the ISIS ideology is resonating more and more with Americans. Can you help us understand what part of that ideology is appealing or why he would say that?

MUDD: Sure. I think the real compelling part of the ISIS ideology is its simplicity. You can summarize this in about one sentence. If you're an impressionistic 15-year-old or 17-year-old, there is a place where you can practice your religion in -- with some sense of purity.

In other words, you can get to the real religion. And the story is coming from native English speakers in Syria, who are able to speak to a 15- or a 17- or 19-year-old in their own language, in their own idiom.

Let me put two stories together here quickly. This is why Secretary Kerry -- Secretary of State Kerry's conversation with the Russians is so important today. This ideology is becoming so pervasive on the Internet that people like me would say eventually you've got to get to the heart of this. You can't stop it in the United States, in the U.K. You've got to root out the evil in Syria and Iraq.

And conversations with the Russians about the end game for President Assad so we can really go after ISIS in Syria are really important.

CAMEROTA: All right. Philip Mudd, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, glad we could provide you all some humor this morning, dissecting this report. Thanks a lot, guys.

MUDD: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Let's get over to Michaela.

PEREIRA: All right, Alisyn. The U.S. and Russia talking face-to- face. Secretary of State Kerry meeting this morning with Vladimir Putin. Can the two sides see eye-to-eye on Ukraine? We'll bring you the latest from the talks, live from Moscow, ahead.

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