Obama staves off fallout from Afghan war book

WILLIAMS: Our White House correspondent Savannah Guthrie here with us in New York because the president is at the UN in New York . What's going on at this days-long gathering?

SAVANNAH GUTHRIE reporting: Well, this is his second meeting of the UN General Assembly , and he'll give kind of a status report on US foreign policy when he addresses the assembly tomorrow with a real emphasis on what the US is trying to do with these direct talks in the Middle East .

WILLIAMS: And about this book that came out, what's been the reaction, considering they invited this journalist in, cooperated, from the traveling White House ?

GUTHRIE: Well, it's fascinating. On the one hand, it's probably bad or at least awkward for some individuals inside the White House because some of the in-fighting that Andrea described. But as far as that larger narrative, frankly the White House is embracing it. They think this shows a president who is very much in command, somebody who went through a very deliberative process, leaned hard on the military, say, 'We need an exit strategy.' And they make no apologies for considering the politics, all of it, recognizing, in their view, that you've got to have America behind the war if you want to get Congress to fund the war.

WILLIAMS: Which leads us, Andrea , to a final question. This does conveniently lay out all the moving parts and their argument for history.

MITCHELL: Right.

WILLIAMS: But I heard Dave Gergen make the point today, what happened to keeping national security deliberations private instead of inviting in a leading investigative journalist?

MITCHELL: And we've seen this before in other White Houses , mostly focused on domestic and economic policy, but also some national security issues. But this really does raise the stakes because the major players who are negotiating with other countries, as Savannah is covering this week here in New York , now have really the scabs pulled off of all of these wounds, and that's damaging and there's going to be some bleeding.

WILLIAMS: All right, Andrea Mitchell , Savannah Guthrie , thanks to you both for joining us here in New York tonight.