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Official to look into the eyes of the committee and the cameras and the world and say i don't know, i thought it was the right answer, the right thing to do. and he was being very honest. so i think he did a very good job yesterday. i don't agree with him on everything, but he came across to me as a pretty straightforward guy. >> david gregory? >> i think this is ultimately a question of where the boundaries are. i agree with the senator, this is a healthy debate, a debate that's going to move forward. the reality is that this is difficult because the technology has moved us to a place where i...

Yes. >> richard haass. >> most of the hearing yesterday was not so much about that, it was more about drone strikes. and i'm curious, the last time i think we were on the show together, you voiced the idea that you thought the white house should be one step back and that the president ought not to be, if you will, in the tactical decision loop on the use of drone strikes. and there have been some 400 of them. is that still your view after yesterday's hearing? >> yes, it is. i would put it just slightly differently. i don't think the president should be involved in essentially tactical decision...

Live lives? so it can't be dismissed. but are there moral and ethical questions that we need to be trying to answer? >> well, i think in the case of the drones, the serious problem is collateral damage, innocents being killed, civilians, women, children, nonparticipants in what is happening or is being planned. but that's easy to say. of course, it's the borderlines between -- in ambiguous situations that are difficult to provide judgment. a group of al qaeda is meeting, planning some strike. we want to preempt it. we have to strike. and unfortunately, someone gets killed in the process. that'...

President probably wants to be involved in trying to answer. but on the issue of americans, which is really going to arise, i think, quite rarely. so this is not the sort of mainstream question of the drones. but when it does arrive, actually the justice department white paper that nbc news obtained last week does acknowledge that it's different when you're dealing with americans. they do have rights. and it goes on to argue that -- well, that essentially doesn't matter. i kind of think there should probably be more discussion about that. again, in just a few cases here. perhaps there ought to...

Then i think we could feel more comfortable about -- >> about the concept. >> -- about the protections of the fifth amendment. but the bottom line is i don't think we should also fully say -- whatever the executive decides is okay. >> right. >> i think that's a problem. >> richard haass. >> david ignatius has written so much about the intelligence community, so i wanted to ask him a question, mika. which is so much of the questioning of brennan was about drones. to some extent the issue of syria coming up, but a big part of his job has got to be analysis. is the committee essentially missing t...