broader strategic look at the middle east and decided that trying to negotiate iran from having a nuclear weapon is the best way forward and then perhaps the consequence or sacrifice of that is not moving full speed to remove president bashar al assad. on the ground the regime has in many ways the upper hand and the concern is if you say ramp up the aid too fast to syrian rebels, perhaps it goes to the wrong people. there have been small programs, training rebels here and there and in jordan and more equipment, lethal and nonlethal, finding its way slowly to them but purposely not enough to change the balance on the ground because that seems to be going in the regime's failure. we talk about syria being a legacy issue for obama. they will debate whether he made the right choice. he that option for a stark intervention when chemical weapons were used. backed away from it whether he chose to put congress in there as a buffer to allow him to back away. no one will know at this point. the key issue certainly is his