MR. KOJO NNAMDIIn politics, the prediction business never goes out of style. Of course, you're listening to the second hour of "The Kojo Nnamdi Show" from WAMU 88.5 at American University in Washington. Welcome to "The Kojo Nnamdi Show," connecting your neighborhood with the world. In politics, the prediction business never goes out of style so let's take a second to consider one of the more popular predictions going around.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIIf the U.S. pulls out of Afghanistan, the dominos will fall and south Asia will become a haven for al-Qaida. In considering this prognostication, it might help to have a sense of history, to have someone around who has covered and reported on events like the Vietnam war when the dominos were supposed to fall, too, but never did. As it turns out, we have Marvin Kalb in the studio who spent 30 years as a reporter for CBS and NBC News.

MR. KOJO NNAMDIHe joins us to explore today's headlines, at home and abroad, and what lessons from history that we may want to apply to these headlines. Marvin Kalb is Edward R. Murrow professor emeritus at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. Marvin, always a pleasure.

MR. MARVIN KALBThank you so much, Kojo, good to be back.

NNAMDIIt can be trite to compare Vietnam to Afghanistan, but this past week, American military and diplomatic officials cited statistics that prove that progress is being made in Afghanistan, statistics measuring the number of captured or killed Taliban leaders, the number of trained police officers. It brings back shades of Robert McNamara citing statistics showing progress in Vietnam. What do you make of the moment we're in right now in Afghanistan and what faith do you have in statistics painting an accurate picture?

KALBWell, not much, taking up that last question first. And you're absolutely right. During the Vietnam war, the easiest thing that the generals could do was to point to casualties, KIA. And if they could say that we went up 14 percent this week, that would suggest to people that we were 14 percent closer to our target.

KALBBut if you look at the current problem in Afghanistan and General Petraeus who's in charge of it all, aside from the president who should be in charge of it all. What General Petraeus is saying -- is you look at certain words. He's using the word transition. There's another word that is being used now and that's end game. People are beginning to talk about the Afghan war as if we're getting out. I just heard somebody in the studio just a couple of minutes ago say, it's all over, it's all over.

KALBWell, think about it for a second. If it were all over, how would that happen? The president of the United States would have to say, we're leaving, we're pulling out. Now, you can say we're pulling out all the way, we've got 100,000 troops there now -- or we're pulling out just a little bit. Let's say you're pulling out just a little bit. That leaves how many? 70, 50,000 American troops there to be absorbed with what? If we were setting up a democracy and if it were a democracy so that people had any confidence in it, then you could say, pat me on the back, I've done a great job. I'm leaving, hip, hip hurray. But Kojo, that is a fairy tale.

NNAMDIThere is no evidence that we're setting up a credible democracy?

KALBNo. The government there is filled with corruption up and down the line. There was another election a couple of weeks ago. They're now even holding up the results of that election because more than 50 percent of the votes they don't think were real. They were fake. If that is the case, then that is another example of corruption. How can the United States get out? Remember -- and you go back to Viet Nam here…

NNAMDII was about to bring that up.

KALB...no democratic president can afford to lose another war. We lost one. Lyndon Johnson lost that war, although the war actually ended...

NNAMDIDuring Richard Nixon's...

KALB...during Richard Nixon's time in office. But it's assumed that Lyndon Johnson did it all wrong. Now, it's assumed that Obama is doing it all wrong. I don't think either did it all wrong. What is happening is that we are involved in a situation that we, as an advanced western nation, cannot handle well. The military would love to have a war where we're set up on both sides. We have tanks, we have planes, both guys do, and we go at it. And we win, hip, hip hurray. But this is asymmetrical warfare. The enemy, we don’t really know who they are or where they are. This is a totally different kind of war and nobody can just -- nobody in this country can simply walk away from it.

NNAMDI800-433-8850 is the number to call if you'd like to join this conversation with Marvin Kalb. During the Vietnam war, Marvin, we were told over and over about the danger of the dominos falling and the foothold that withdrawal would leave for communism. What would be the worst case scenario if we pulled out of Afghanistan? Why do I feel we're going to hear those arguments again?

KALBWell, I think we are hearing those arguments again. But let's go back, for just one second, to the Vietnam war when that argument was being advanced. The ultimate was that communism would sweep down and take over all of southeast Asia.

NNAMDIYes.

KALBWell, it didn't happen. The Vietnamese now are hooked up with whom? With the United States. Against whom? Against China. What a weird twist of history at this point. And you think about the dominos falling in south Asia. The only domino that we're really concerned about is Pakistan. And the reason we're concerned about Pakistan is that it possesses nuclear weapons. And it has many bad guys running around the northwestern part of the country who would love to get their hands on a nuclear weapon.

KALBEven if they -- forget about using the weapon, just say you have it. What an impact. That's where the dominos begin to fall. The impact that that has cascading down the rest of Asia and everybody looking toward the bad guys, the Taliban has a nuclear weapon, oh, my God.

NNAMDIYes. But if we are to follow the lesson of Vietnam, where we obviously could not predict what would happen later, where our initial assumptions, our presumptions that if Vietnam fell then the rest of the dominos would fall and southeast Asia would all go communist and from there it would lead to, essentially, one country after another until it was at our doorstep. We seem to be following a similar logic this time, that if Pakistan falls and Pakistan has nuclear weapons, then radical Islamists will be able to take over the rest of that part of the world and attack us. Are we ignoring, if you will, the internal dynamic in those countries, the one that we can't really predict.

KALBWell, and this is part of the problem that I was trying to suggest a moment ago. We are dealing with forces today that we really don't know that much about. When we were in Vietnam, we didn't know anything about the culture of the country, the religion of the country or the history of the country. We didn't realize that the Vietnamese had had more than 1,000 years of warfare against the Chinese. We simply didn't have that in mind. Right now, we know equally very little about Afghanistan.

KALBI spoke with a general not too long ago who told me that when he went to Afghanistan, he knew that there was a war. He was going to fight the war, but he wasn't really sure against whom. There is an idea out there of an enemy, but not the reality of an enemy. And right now, General Petraeus, who is an incredibly able and smart general, is using words like transition, end game. He's playing with the idea that we're getting out. That is to take care of the president's political problems here at home.

KALBBut the reality there is raised by such questions as, can Obama truly leave Afghanistan? The answer is yes. How do you do that? How do you really do that? What is it that you leave behind? I spoke to a very high official yesterday who told me that the only thing that realistically we see on the sort of near horizon is a renewed civil war.

NNAMDIIn Afghanistan.

KALBIn Afghanistan, between people allied with Karzai, the president, people allied with the Taliban -- and there are two or three Talibans. It's not one outfit run by one person. There are many people around. They are all struggling for control of their land. We're trying to find a way of fighting our way out of their land. So we're really trapped. Kojo, I honestly, this is -- this is a big-time awfulness occurring.

NNAMDIAnd it doesn't get less complicated. By the way, we're talking with Marvin Kalb. He's the Edward R. Murrow professor emeritus at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. And taking your calls at 800-433-8850 or you can join the conversation at our website, kojoshow.org. It doesn't get less complicated. Even as we speak, a Pakistani delegation is here to talk about relieving tensions between the U.S. and its ally in the region, Pakistan.

KALBAbsolutely. Absolutely. And we are now -- the U.S. government is in -- sort of in a -- the Russians call it a (unintelligible) literally in a corner without knowing exactly what to do. Because the president now, since he's been in office, has had two huge reviews of policy. There is a constant reviewing of policy. And at the bottom of the day, our relationship with our key ally, Pakistan, is up the creek. I mean, we simply don't know where we are. The thing that hangs over us is a fear, many years in duration, by the way, that if Pakistan's nuclear weapons fall into the wrong hands, we're in a totally different world at that point.

KALBBecause then, all of these forces, Islamic, fanatical forces, moderate forces, radicals, militants, whatever you want to call them, there are people who want us out. And if we don't get out, we're not going to be satisfying them. We don't want them to have nuclear weapons. We don't know quite how to manage this and so we have meetings. There's a big meeting going on now in Rome. General Petraeus is there. Ambassador Holbrooke is there. The Iranians are now there. And that's a big deal. That's a big deal. They are there because their border with Afghanistan is porous.

KALBAnd all kinds of drugs are going across the border infecting the poor people of Iran, just as the Russians are terrified, truly, in terms of what's happening in their society because of drugs. Where do the drugs come from? Afghanistan. So they want to -- they want to somehow control this. But they had their chance in the 1980s and didn't do it. And we're having our chance now.

NNAMDILet's complicate the world just a little bit more with Terric in Alexandria, Va. Terric, you're on the air. Go ahead, please.

TERRICHi, Kojo, how are you today?

NNAMDIReal well.

TERRICAnd I say hi to your guest as well. I have two questions very quick. The first one, you think the next war in the middle east between the western extremers (sp?) can it be the south Sudan, if the south Sudan is undivided from north to south? And how do we know Russian did not have been Taliban to try to back with the Taliban (unintelligible) during the Regan time, that KGB may be the helping these guys?

NNAMDIWell, Marvin is the Russia expert in the room. I don't know of any indication that Russia has been assisting the Taliban. Marvin, what do you know?

KALBMy sense is no. They would like very much to get rid of the Taliban because the Taliban has been instrumental in firing up the enthusiasm of Islamist and fanatics by the way who are now in an insurgent mode in Chechnya in Russia and Dagestan in the north Caucuses, still controlled by Russia. And so the Russians find that they have their own Islamic lead fanatical movements against Russian authority in areas that the Russians consider their own. So, no, they're not there. The other question you'd raised about the Sudan is a very real one.

KALBAnd there's a lot of worrying going on now between whether the government of Sudan would really take advantage in another couple of months of trying to simply take total control over whatever movements are underway in the southern part of Sudan. If they do that, there's going to be a lot more fighting, a lot more killing and the U.S. does not have an answer to that either.

NNAMDIThere's a vote coming up in Sudan on whether southern Sudan will vote to remain a part of...

KALBExactly.

NNAMDI...Sudan or vote...

KALBExactly.

NNAMDI...to separate. And then sentiment at this time seems to be that southern Sudan will vote to become independent. The north where the government in Khartoum is, is not looking too kindly on that. And all reports indicate that if southern Sudan votes for independence, than both sides seem to be arming themselves to prepare for a conflict. The Obama administration is interested in trying to head that off, but it's a very difficult situation to deal with.

KALBA very difficult one indeed. And where did the weapons come from, on both sides?

NNAMDIExactly right. And there are...

KALBBut because we have been selling weapons to these people for a long time. -- the Russians, by the way, have been selling weapons for a long time.

NNAMDIThe Chinese are in Sudan also.

KALBChinese are involved in that as well.

NNAMDIYes, so you don't know where this is...

KALBIt's a kind of -- at the moment, it's sort of slightly controlled anarchy. It's ever so slightly controlled.

NNAMDIWhat's taking place? Terric, thank you very much for your call. Another issue that President Obama's facing down, major gridlock, is the Arab/Israeli peace process. It's my understanding that you feel the administration is paying the price for making the wrong move in the very first play of the game.

KALBThat's right, Kojo. And that's a sad, sad story. I was at a meeting yesterday with a very prominent Israeli scholar and he was talking about this problem in a very real, very sophisticated way. And yet, I could not help but feel that I have heard all of this for about 40 or 50 years now, the exact same arguments, advance perhaps in a different guise every now and then, by different leaders, but it's essentially the same argument. What happened at the beginning of the Obama administration was that somebody sold the president a terrible bill of goods.

KALBAnd it was that if the United States immediately calls for the Israelis to stop all settlement activity in Palestinian-occupied lands, that that would put the U.S. on the side of the angels, meaning, in this case, the Palestinians.

NNAMDIGreater credibility with the Palestinians.

KALBGreater creditably with the Palestinians, with the entire Arab world. The President then went and made a wonderful speech in Cairo, all with a view in the back of his mind, I believe, of saying, I'm giving you this, now you give me something in return.

NNAMDIWhat he did not take into consideration was the internal politics in the state of Israel and whether Prime Minister Netanyahu could do that and survive.

KALBAbsolutely. And what Netanyahu was -- has told the President time and time again, you continue to push me where you want me to be and my government goes down. If you then believe that you can get another government in Israel that will be more compliant to your views, you may proceed.

NNAMDIGood luck.

KALBBut good luck and watch your step because you don't know how this is all going to work out. Moreover, everybody in the U.S. government and in the Israeli government recognize that if anybody, any Israeli leader is around today who can pull off a major agreement with the Palestinians and survive, it would be Netanyahu because he represents the center and the right of Israeli political life. In much the same way that Nixon...

NNAMDIMena -- Menachem Begin.

KALB...and Menachem Begin could do it earlier on with Sadat and Nixon did it before with the Chinese. This is a wonderful belief and it's partly what keeps Netanyahu in office right now. It's a promise that he can deliver the goods ultimately. You can walk him down the road of pressure until he either collapses or rebels. And if he rebels, you get nothing. If he collapses, you may get something. So you've got to work that. And with the Israelis and the Palestinians now, the arguments are old, but they are advanced with the same passion as if it was new, as if it was something they simply -- both sides just discovered. But they've been at it, Kojo, for -- it really comes down on the Arab side to a deep difficulty and simply accepting for all time, a Jewish state right in the middle of the Middle East.

KALBOn the Israeli side, it's a fear that if they set themselves up, they're going to bad guys. There are a lot of good guys there, too, but there are going to be a couple of bad guys who try to undermine us and drive us into the sea in the way Ahmadinejad in Iran was saying in southern Lebanon just a few days ago, this (sounds like) desionus have no legitimacy. They won't be here, good-bye. Well, you know, if you're an Israeli and you hear that, what are you going to think?

NNAMDIAnd that's the dilemma that President Barack Obama now finds himself in, in the Middle East. We're talking with Marvin Kalb. He is Edward R. Murrow Professor Emeritus at the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. We're going to take a short break to continue our fall membership campaign. After that is over, we'll continue this conversation with Marvin. If you have called already, stay on the line. If you haven't yet, you can still call 800-433-8850 or make a comment at our website, kojoshow.org. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.

NNAMDIWe're talking with Marvin Kalb. He is the Edward R. Murrow professor emeritus at The Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. Marvin spent 30 years as an award-winning reporter for CBS and NBC news, including stints as chief diplomatic correspondence, Moscow bureau chief and host of "Meet the Press."

NNAMDIAnd Marvin, when Brendan Sweeney was talking there a little while ago about exactly what he was experiencing in Haiti and what it takes for a foreign correspondent to file a story, I saw you nodding in agreement.

KALBI was nodding away there and in excitement. Because what he was pointing out was something that I think your listeners ought to be, perhaps, a bit more focused on. In the past couple of years, as there have been increasing economic pressures on the media, one of the ways in which networks and newspapers have saved money is by cutting foreign bureaus.

NNAMDICorrect.

KALBSo that as we're more deeply involved in the world and as our young men and women are actually fighting in different parts of the world, we have fewer American reporters telling the American people what is actually happening. So the net effect of that is that we're left with headlines. The idea that you -- I didn't know until I heard this now, that you are gonna go down to Haiti. I think that is marvelous, a wonderful example of exactly what it is that a station like MAU can do.

NNAMDIAnd you describe succinctly the pressures on us to go to Haiti. Because foreign bureaus are being depleted, the demand from our listening audience is greater to know more and more detail about what's going on in that part of the world.

KALBAnd this is one of the things. Do the American people really care? Do they want to know about what is happening in Haiti? My answer to that is absolutely, yes. They really do want to know. They want to be treated as adults. They want to get the information so that they can make up their minds about what is in their best interest.

KALBAnd to me, one of the crisis that we face today in American journalism, is that increasingly American journalism, as an institution, is putting its head in the sand, for economic reasons primarily, and allowing the hucksters, allowing the jokesters and allowing the talksters to get out there and to dominate the field when there ought to be a lot more good solid reporting. Then, the American people can figure it out themselves.

NNAMDIAnd I don't know if you would call this a crisis in American culture. I know you certainly see it as a problem. But it's my understanding that you recently spent some time reading President John F. Kennedy's inaugural address and were struck by how it applies or does not apply to today's cultural climate in the United States.

KALBOh, Kojo. This was one of those moments that -- I suppose we all have them in our lives. But I was honored last week by the Harvard Club of Washington with its public service award. Now, they asked for a speech. I was delighted to do it. And it occurred to me that the Kennedy School at Harvard was having its own public service week last week which is a marvelous link. And that will end with a celebration in January of next year, with the 50th anniversary of John Kennedy's inauguration as president of the United States.

KALBSo I went back and read his inaugural address. And I have to tell you, there were times when I had tears in my eyes as I was reading that because it represented, for me, an evocation of the best that we put together, what it is that we can do as a nation. And it also raised a question in my mind of what we may yet be able to do as a nation once we rise up from this unhappy trough now of political division and God knows what else.

NNAMDIA great deal of anger. Nobody asking, it would appear, anymore, what can I do for my country?

KALBAnd that was the Kennedy line that brought the most tears. Ask not what you can do -- no. Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. That was his call to public service. That was reaching into a body of Americana ready for a new kind of leadership. And I have a feeling -- I could be dead wrong about this, but I have a feeling that right now in all of the anger that we see and hear about on talk shows on cable television, if we had the leadership that could evoke those thoughts -- what is it that you can do for your country?

KALBDon't just sit back in splendid isolation and expect the world to come to you. What is it that you, as an individual in this country with all of its problems now, what can you do to make things better for other people?

NNAMDIRather than...

KALBAnd that, by the way, without, you know, getting involved in all of your fundraising, but that, to me, is the essence of what this program is about. And a lot of stuff that one gets at MAU, at NPR, across the board, you seem to be interested in helping people understand.

NNAMDIIndeed, one gets the impression that we are angry at our government. We are angry at our elected officials. We are angry about the high rate of unemployment. We are angry about everything, but the things we can do ourselves to improve the situation.

KALBPrecisely. And I guess you could ask the question, why is that? And maybe the simple answer is that there aren't enough jobs to go around. And if we had some more jobs, people would be more absorbed with good and virtuous work, than really divisive chatter.

NNAMDIBut I guess one also has to look at what it is that drives individuals. And individuals can be inspired by leadership and that's what John F. Kennedy was able to do. Anyway, enough of...

KALBAnyway.

NNAMDI...enough of inspiration. Let's get to politics. Most polls seem to indicate that Republicans will pick up a good number of congressional seats in the next two weeks. Things look even better for conservatives when you consider the amount of money coming into their races on their behalf, monies that we sometimes don't know the sources of. What precedent is there for money influencing an election in this fashion?

NNAMDII just read this morning that out in California in the race for governor, Meg Whitman, the former CEO of eBay, has spent $139 million of her own money.

KALBPetty cash. (laugh) That's petty cash. No. But there's a madness. You are buying the election.

NNAMDIObviously.

KALBSo much of the elections today on the salesmanship of the election involves television and radio ads. So you have to buy that from local stations. You go around the country putting down bids. How much will this station accept? And what they're doing now -- the stations themselves ought to be ashamed of themselves because they are making a ton of money.

KALBAnd the money is now pouring in in a way that we have never had in this country in the last hundred years. It is pouring in without any knowledge of where it is coming from. So it could be coming from totally virtuous corporations, individuals wishing simply to express their views by providing all of this money, or it could be coming from people we haven't a clue about.

KALBRemember during the Nixon times, when people would arrive in Washington D.C. with satchels full of cash.

NNAMDIYes.

KALBThey would then arrive at the White House with a satchel. Not with their underwear, but with cash, in order to buy influence. And who knows where all of this money is coming from right now. We've got to be aware that it is -- from what we know, it is tilting much more in a Republican direction, much, much more.

NNAMDIOnto one of the issues we discussed earlier. Here's Moson in Frederick, Md. Moson, you are on the air. I think Moson wants to take about Pakistan. Moson, go ahead, please.

MOSONHi, how are you, Kojo?

NNAMDII'm well.

MOSONThank you for taking my call. I was listening earlier about Pakistan and their nuclear weapons. And I was listening to Secretary Clinton's speech yesterday about Pakistan and about how much less taxes the people over there pay. That country is pretty much run by American tax dollars. How come we cannot demand to secure their nuclear facilities? In other words, just cut the money out. I'll take the answer offline.

KALBAll right. We have been trying for a very, very long to gain influence in the Pakistani government. But we are caught sometimes by the requirements over a policy, sometimes by our rhetoric in policy. We talk a great deal about democracy. So when the military takes over in Pakistan, and by the way, imposes a degree of control over all of the (word?) elements in that country, we are obliged to try to get rid of the military and get a civilian government.

KALBWe get a civilian government, it doesn't function terribly well and it's generally corrupt. Besides, in this case, the Pakistani intelligence people have not only a great deal of control over the nuclear weapons of Pakistan, but over the Taliban activities in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. So the U.S., at this point, does not know quite what to do. If you pull the money as you're suggesting, what might happen is that that the government simply falls.

KALBAnd if the government falls, what happens then? The military takes over or the left-wing extremists can simply proclaim independence and Pakistan begins to fall apart. That is also a possibility that the U.S. wants to stop. So Moson, you have raised a very interesting question, but it doesn't have an easy answer.

NNAMDIMoson, thank you very much for your call. This we got from Evelyn in Gaithersburg. "Perhaps Obama is ready to learn the lessons from the Vietnam era when it comes to Afghanistan, but I don't think he's taking the right lessons from the Clinton era when it comes to other issues. It's not the '90s anymore. And when he started, he pretty much put the Clinton administration band back together expecting they could work their magic and fix today's problems.

NNAMDIWe need new ideas, not Larry Summers, part two. Maybe the new people he's bringing on board will move things in a different direction. I'm happy that Summers and Emmanuel have moved into their next opportunities. I don't think anybody much expected that they stay longer than they have."

KALBWell, no, they didn't. And also, so far anyway, the President has some very, very big decisions to make in the next couple of weeks. But so far anyway, he does not seem to be going outside of his immediate family. He seems to be sticking with those people who worked the campaign with him and who were there at the very beginning, the first year-and-a-half of his administration. So my gut feeling, based only on what has happened so far, is that the President is sticking with those people who brought him to the dance.

NNAMDIHere is Jim in Washington D.C. Jim, you're on the air. Go ahead, please. Hi, Jim. I think we just lost Jim. Here is Fred in Falls Church, Va. Hi Fred.

FREDHello, Kojo. I would like to comment on the international news. First of all, like, when Marvin was talking about pulling out of news coverage, to see international news on television to see what's going on, the best ones are Al Jazeera English and RT, which is Russian television. And that comes out of -- headquartered in Virginia, too.

NNAMDISure.

FREDBut I wanted to ask about why we never hear about the work of Greg Mortenson by our news coverage who, you know, wrote "Three Cups of Tea," and "Stones Into Schools," and he's built like 130-something schools...

KALBYes.

FRED...by 2009. And the only thing I've seen is, like, a segment on "60 Minutes "and one other mention and why -- how our government could learn from what he's doing.

NNAMDIWell, when you say the only thing I've seen is a segment on "60 Minutes," that's pretty big.

KALBIt is big. And there have been a good bit of information passed on. We're talking about it on the basis of the information that we have read provided by reporters. There isn't enough of that kind of information. I totally agree with Fred on that point. And it would be wonderful if the American people had the time and the interest to watch Al Jazeera in English, to watch Russian television, so long as it is balanced by an adequate presentation of unbiased, clearly-presented, interestingly written news stories that give the American people a scope, a context.

KALBKojo used the word context before in introducing the kind of thing that is so much evident on his own program. But that is what the American people need on a very broad scale. And at the moment, because of economic problems, technological problems, we're in the midst of a communications revolution. We don't know how this is all going to end, but we do know we're in the midst of something that is here today and wasn’t here yesterday.

NNAMDIAbsolutely. Fred, thank you very much for your call. What strategy do you think President Obama would be wise to pursue with the new Congress that's coming here next year. Do you think -- do you expect he'll be more conciliatory and work with Republicans? He claims that’s what he's been trying to do before like Bill Clinton did. Or do you expect he'll be aggressive with his agenda and confrontational?

KALBI think that's another one of those $64,000 questions that...

NNAMDIYeah.

KALB...you so enjoy throwing at me. My belief, at this point, Kojo, is that the President is fed up, simply fed up with his inability to get through to the Republicans and elicit some degree of Republican support on a whole range of issues that the Republicans themselves have advanced and now is simply setting up one obstacle after another. I think that he is not going to be as open and as obliging.

KALBAnd this is going to be because no matter who wins the House, if it goes Republican, the Senate, if it goes Republican, either way it's going to be by a diminished majority. The Republicans are not going to have a large majority in either house. And let's say that they win the House and lose the Senate, it will be by a very tight majority. Therefore, you don't have the flexibility to be grand and daring and adventuresome and move forward.

KALBHe's got -- I think the president is going to have to be very pragmatic. He's going to have to figure out, I want A, B and C. Nobody's going to deter me from that. That's what I want. I'm going to use all of my strengths. And if the Republicans think they're going to ram something past me, it ain't going to happen because I, as President, have to sign it. I can veto anything. Now, the Republicans know that, too.

KALBSo what are we looking toward? Unfortunately, a lot more of the kind of gridlock that we've seen up to this point.

NNAMDIWe won't be looking for bipartisanship in the next Congress in the United States. Well, speaking of up the creek without a paddle, which is how the president might be, (laugh) your beloved New York Yankees last night...

KALBOh, no.

NNAMDI...were drug by the Texas Rangers eight to zero.

KALBOh, no.

NNAMDIThey now trail the Rangers two games to one in the American League Championship Series.

KALBOh, yes.

NNAMDIWhat are your hopes from here on in?

KALBMy hopes -- my hopes are that the Yankees can pick themselves up and create a miracle tonight by pitching Mr. Burnett. But we have to be aware, Kojo, Burnett, in about 25 outings this year, has won four games and lost something like 15. He's got a 6.8 earned run average. He has been a calamity. Now, if you believe in God and he governs everything you do, maybe Burnett can give up no more than four or five runs tonight.

KALBBut that means the Yankees -- the Yankee bats, including Jeter, including Rodriguez, Teixeira, all of these guys who were sound asleep, would only wake up and get moving. The Yankees can't be as bad as they seemed yesterday.

NNAMDIThe pitching isn't that great so it's going to be the bats that are going to have to save the Yankees at this one.

KALBOh, boy, they've got to do something.

NNAMDIAnd Marvin Kalb will probably be praying about it. (laugh) Marvin Kalb is Edward R. Murrow professor emeritus at The Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University. Marvin, so good to see you. Thank you for joining us.

KALBThank you, Kojo. Thank you very much.

NNAMDIAnd thank you all for listening. I'm Kojo Nnamdi.