David Gergen

I think he was right to go to Pittsburgh, not today. It became an extremely awkward day for the president. He did the right thing in wanting to go and comfort families. But the awkwardness started right after the fact that he arrived…

One of the first major things you do is to silence your critics, especially in the press. You try to find -- you try to delegitimize them and discredit them so that they won't be taken seriously in what they report and then you can run…

I don't think he has a strategy on almost anything. I think he has reactions and he plays it by ear. And I do think he thinks its working and he would continue it.

He bears indirect responsibility and he ought to acknowledge that and step up to it. That's what a serious, you know, brave president would do, a man of integrity would do.

President Trump clearly wants to turn the border question into a midterm elections issue over the next couple of weeks, and he wants to crack down on it.

I do think there's a new element here, Anderson, since we last visited this question, and that is that President Trump has introduced the notion of sending troops to the border, U.S. troops.

If at the end of the day there is only an indictment of Roger Stone and no indictment of anyone else or no charges leveled against the president with regard to collusion or obstruction, that will be a major victory. The White House would…

I think it's extremely important. The country has been put through 17 months of this drama, and now there are all sorts of questions about what was this all about? What was going on in the Trump Organization? How should we make adjustments…

I think it's a sad night, an embarrassing night for the country, Anderson.

It would have been so much better to postpone Kanye West for four or five days, have a conversation did the President can't go to the people who are suffering so much, have a serious conversation in the White House for God sake, about the…

But I think if you look at the overall national picture, the women are fired up and the Republicans are still in deficit heading forward.

There's been none of that. There's none of that grace here.

It is destructive of ever getting back on the track that Governor Kasich was describing.

I don't think we can make a fair judgment about what kind of justice Mr. Kavanaugh is going to be until about a year or two from now.

He said that Kavanaugh had been proven innocent. We all know that is simply not true.

It seems to be boiling down to politics. That's exactly the way it shouldn't come down.

It should be just as transparent as possible, it should be as thorough as possible.

I think the pattern of drinking is actually very, very important for resolving this.

There are going to be a millions of people who are going to be very, very unhappy and angry.

If he testified under oath and lied to the country about it, which is basically what Mr. Roche is saying, that's relevant to whether he ought to be on the Supreme Court.

We, the public, have been misled by the -- what's going on in Washington, by the President, by his party.

But I want to say Republican leaders who are unhappy tonight one day will thank Jeff Flake. He pulled them, along with Chris Coons, pulled them back from the brink of what would be -- what would have become the most divisive vote in…

We need to dig deeper.

What was missing throughout an hour and 15 minutes was any sign of empathy. Any sign of sympathy and understanding and compassion.

Do they really want to go down in history that way?