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Interview with Jake Tapper; Interview with Kitty Kelley; Interview with Oliver Stone; Interview with Sir Roger Moore

Aired November 18, 2012 - 21:00   ET


PIERS MORGAN, HOST: Tonight, "General Chaos," a four-star disgrace rocking Washington. ABC senior White House correspondent Jake Tapper takes on the men and women at the center of this shocking story.


JAKE TAPPER, ABC NEWS SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: They start to believe their own press clippings. That's the danger.


MORGAN: Sex, lies and power.


KITTY KELLEY, AUTHOR, "CAPTURING CAMELOT": It is so sad, the end of someone's career.


MORGAN: The history of scandals and shame. Author Kitty Kelley on the Petraeus affair. And her explosive new book about the Kennedys, with never before seen photos of Camelot.

Also, the unconventional wisdom of Oliver Stone. The director of "JFK" and "Nixon" on the downfall of David Petraeus.


OLIVER STONE, FILM DIRECTOR: He should have been long ago investigated far more severely by our media.


MORGAN: And the most debonair 007 of them all, Sir Roger Moore, on Bond, then and now.


MORGAN: He does all his own stunts. You never did that, did you?

ROGER MOORE, ACTOR: I did a couple of the love scenes.


Good evening. The reelection celebration seems a long time ago for President Obama. One week after defeating Governor Romney, he was staring down reporters at the White House, fielding questions on the Petraeus scandal, Benghazi, the fiscal cliff and America's future. This has been a long couple of weeks for the administration, with many still waiting for answers.

Jake Tapper is the ABC News senior White House correspondent. He's also an author. His new book is called "The Outpost: An Untold Story of American Valor."

Jake, welcome.

TAPPER: Thank you so much. It's great to be here.

MORGAN: It is almost perfect timing this book, because we were just discussing before we went on air that it concerns two great generals in the book, McChrystal and Petraeus, and the kind of celebrification, if you like, of the generals. And they are both gone before the book has really even hit the streets. Could you have ever imagined, when you were out there embedded with these troops, that that would happen?

TAPPER: No. And the book is mainly about the grunts on the ground. But it does look a lot at how people like President Bush, President Obama, their secretaries of defense, and how these celebrity generals -- how their decisions end up affecting these guys at this very vulnerable outpost at the bottom of three steep mountains, just 14 miles from the Pakistan border.

One of the things that emerges in the book is that McChrystal and his aides are obsessed with the idea of the celebrity general, as Petraeus has become. Petraeus, if you read his press clips, would you believe he was the savior of the war in Iraq. They wanted McChrystal to be that.

And there is this hubris that takes over celebrity generals.

MORGAN: Hence the interviews with "Rolling Stone" for Stanley McChrystal, hence the biography that Petraeus did, which, in the end, brought him down in many ways, putting in contact with this woman.

TAPPER: They start to believe their own press clippings. That's the danger.

MORGAN: I was going to say that. And they start to play the media game in a game that you and I know normally ends in tears. .

TAPPER: Well, we are a fickle bunch, aren't we, Piers? And one day we are nice to you. The next day we are not.

General McChrystal very much, from the beginning of the time he was appointed to the head of the forces in Afghanistan is -- from the very moment of his confirmation hearing, he and the White House are in this back and forth. And it is actually long before that "Rolling Stone" story with Michael Hastings, getting he and his aides to bad mouth the administration. It's a long tug of war, and it ends up having disastrous and deadly consequences for the men at the bottom of this hill.

MORGAN: Because it must be a huge distraction, all this, for the guys. My brother has fought out there. And you don't want to have the generals involved in scandal and mayhem and media stuff. It is just a total distraction, isn't it?

TAPPER: It is. And I have to say, with the Petraeus story breaking, we had a book launch on Saturday night. And a lot of the troops in the book came, a lot of their moms, gold star moms, gold star wives. And when Petraeus was mentioned, it was just this incredulousness.

These men served in an area of the country where they would not see a woman for months, because every time they went into an Afghan village, the women would either hide or be hidden from them.

MORGAN: And there is their boss having an affair.

TAPPER: Exactly. And it got so bad -- there's a scene in the book like this, where it was like they were on a planet where women do not exist anymore. There was a female helicopter pilot that would buzz over them every now and then. They would all run to the communications shed, just to listen to her voice. They were convinced she was absolutely gorgeous.

Meanwhile, what is Petraeus doing in Afghanistan a few years later? It's madness.

MORGAN: There is a theory that look, come on, we had great generals, MacArthur, Patton, Eisenhower, they all had affairs. Great presidents, JFK, Clinton and so on, all had affairs. It is only modern, digital era unraveling all this stuff that is the problem. What do you say to that?

TAPPER: Well, I don't think the idea -- the problem is that General Petraeus had an affair. I think the idea -- the big problem is that he was director of the CIA and he walked right into one of the blackmail-able situations you can have.

I mean, it is good that the FBI found out before the Russians or the Chinese. That's the problem. It's not that he is a general messing around. And certainly, even though according to the Uniform Code of Military Justice that is not allowed, that's not what the press is focused on. The press is focused on the director of the CIA having this problem.

MORGAN: Perhaps the biggest story today is Benghazi, which is blowing up again. Republicans John McCain and Lindsey Graham and other senators pushing very, very hard now, getting very vicious in the rhetoric towards Ambassador Rice and so on. What do you think -- at the central plank of this, do you believe that Ambassador Rice is at fault? Or is she -- as Barack Obama said, she was merely passing on intelligence. She was not a key player in all of this. And therefore, if he wants to make her Secretary of State, he can do it. What do you think?

TAPPER: First of all, I was substituting for George Stephanopoulos that Sunday as host of "This Week." And we were trying to get Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. All the shows were trying to get Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to talk about Benghazi.

For whatever reason, she didn't go out. They put out Dr. Susan Rice, the U.N. ambassador. It's very interesting that tonight President Obama says, you know, Susan Rice had nothing to do with Benghazi. Then I don't what she was doing on the show.

MORGAN: That was my reaction. Didn't she make herself a key player? She was the person put out by the administration to launch the defense. And she could have said, look, we believe there are a number of possible theories here. That may have been a get out. But she didn't take that option.

TAPPER: Yes, she, I think, was a good soldier. She did what the administration told her to do. She read the talking points.

MORGAN: Did she act in good faith, do you think?

TAPPER: I can't get inside her brain. I don't -- I think she was repeating the intelligence and what the White House told her to say. Because what she was saying was very similar to what everybody in the White House and the State Department was saying at the time.

So I don't think she was doing anything other than what she had been instructed to say. The big question is not whether this was one of the prominent theories, that it was all a spontaneous protest from the anti-Muslim video. It was, obviously, one of the prominent theories.

But on September 14th, at the White House briefing, I said to Jay Carney there are other people in your government who say that it is probably not the video, that it's something else here in Benghazi. And for whatever reason, it seems like I had better intelligence and sources in the government than people in the White House did, because they were leaning heavily into this videotape theory.

MORGAN: Or as John McCain would have us believe -- and he's got a very strong point about this -- it may well just have been the narrative for the White House running for the election of we are defeating al Qaeda, is not helped if it looks like an al Qaeda type resurgence was up against the ambassador in Benghazi and, indeed, led to his death. That's a problem, isn't it?

TAPPER: Without question, as somebody who was covering the Benghazi story in the months leading up to the election, and also covering the election, it was so politicized with the White House and the administration in a defensive crouch, because they thought every word they said would be twisted and unfairly attacked. And they didn't obviously want to interfere with a positive narrative about al Qaeda.


MORGAN: Jake, it's a fascinating book, "The Outpost, an Untold Story of American Valor," a riveting read about this extraordinary battle, but more about the people on the ground doing the hard stuff for their country. Good to see you.

TAPPER: Thanks, Piers. Great to be here.

MORGAN: Coming up next, a woman who's seen her fair share of fallen idols. Kitty Kelley on the Petraeus sex scandal and her new book on the Kennedys, "Camelot."


MORGAN: If there's anyone who knows about these sometimes tricky relationship between a biographer and her subject, it's surely my next guest. Kitty Kelley has written unauthorized biographies about almost everyone, from Oprah to the Bush family to Nancy Reagan and Frank Sinatra. So who better to talk about idols -- Kitty Kelley's latest book is "Capturing Camelot," some unseen pictures of the Kennedys.

And she joins me now. Welcome, Kitty. How are you?

KELLEY: Thanks, Piers.

MORGAN: Can't think of a better person to talk to about this Petraeus scandal that's now erupting every hour, some new bombshell. The FBI agent sending shirtless pictures, the second general coming in. It's all good, juicy fare, isn't it? What do you make of what's happened to Petraeus? He's such a great iconic, all American hero in many ways, just brought right to his knees by this.

KELLEY: It is so sad, so sad, the end of someone's career. There's something we're missing, though. There's something missing. I don't know what it is. Is it just -- is it just jealous e-mails between two women that have set this off? That isn't usually how the FBI operates.

MORGAN: I think that's exactly what's happened. I think that's exactly what triggered this. And that's what makes it an extraordinary downfall, because really, that's what it comes down to, a couple of women swapping (INAUDIBLE) comments.

KELLEY: Well, the e-mails, as I understand, were anonymous. And they went from Broadwell to this Jill Kelley, right? And it took issue with her coziness with General Petraeus. So it does sound like two women. But we now have two generals that are involved. And you know, the military is held to a higher standard than, say, someone like Frank Sinatra. A higher standard almost than our politicians.

MORGAN: And it has to be, I mean, funny enough, the people who feel least sorry for David Petraeus are the people inside the military. Because they understand the importance of this kind of behavior in terms of discipline and everything else, because they know that if one of the lower ranks was caught having an affair, a low-ranking officer, they'd be straight out the door. KELLEY: But you know, Piers, the military code, if he had done this while he was in uniform, that would be a criminal violation within the military code. So they themselves hold their people to a higher standard. And you are right that the people, civilians are the one who are saying oh, isn't it a shame that he had to give up his job. But the military is quite tough on this.

MORGAN: It's a tragedy for him. A great general in many ways.

Let's talk about Paula Broadwell, because she's a biographer who wrote this book about him. It was seen by many people as pretty sycophantic in the end, which is hardly surprising as they were as intimate as now seems to be the case. But what do you think of the relationship there between a writer and the subject, so close?

You never got within 100 yards of Sinatra, yet still wrote an amazing book about him. Do you think it's healthy for a biographer to be that close to their subject?

KELLEY: No. I believe firmly in writing an unauthorized biography, which is you do it without the subject's cooperation, and that means you don't give up editorial control. She wrote an authorized biography. So she had to give General Petraeus complete control. I don't think it was a burden on her part or his part. But nevertheless, it doesn't make for the most honest, open kind of biography.

MORGAN: Well, she certainly wasn't very critical of him. And we had a fascinating debate, Michael Hastings came on from Buzzfeed and Rolling Stone, and he really hammered Petraeus. There is a real school of thought now that you know, he was every man's hero on one side, well, a lot of other people said look, you know, what happened in Iraq and Afghanistan, these weren't the acts of military heroism. They all went pretty horribly wrong, is another view.

KELLEY: And it's a legitimate view. But it's a view that also should be taken by the mainstream media. And the mainstream media is a little bit complicit in building up Petraeus as much as they did.

MORGAN: Well, he played the media very well. I met him at a party earlier this year, and he was extremely charming, and willing to talk in a way that I was quite surprised that he'd talk to-

KELLEY: Exactly, and that openness.

MORGAN: Which I kind of applauded him for, but obviously that was how he managed to control, I guess, the mystique, if you like.

KELLEY: Well, and he brought great credentials to the table. I mean, he was the intellectual general, right? He was schooled at West Point, had a Ph.D. from Princeton.

MORGAN: Listen, I'm a big fan of Petraeus. I think he was a brilliant general. And this is a tragedy for him. But what would have happened, for example -- with one of your subjects, JFK -- what would have happened to JFK if e-mail and text messaging had existed? KELLEY: Yes. Although I do remember a wonderful story about JFK during the campaign when he was running for Senate in 1957. Someone brought in a picture and said, they're prepared to use this picture of you with this woman. And he looked at it and said I remember her well. So he sort of took it in stride. But he was very, very lucky. Very lucky.

MORGAN: I think a lot of those guys from that era, because I think this digital trail that now comes.

KELLEY: Also, the women that fell in love -- I mean, that had affairs with JFK mostly fell in love with him. And yet the affairs that he had with White House secretaries would have been considered so inappropriate for a boss.

MORGAN: Should it matter, Kitty? I mean, you have written about all these great characters, Sinatra and JFK and others. They're all flawed. But they're all, in their own way, geniuses. He was a political genius. Sinatra was a musical genius. Does it matter if they have affairs?

KELLEY: I think that's such a great question. Part of me says there really should be a divide between the public man and the private man. Notice we're talking men, not women. It's always men that do this.

On the other hand, that isn't the way of the world right now. And we do hold our politicians, especially our presidents, to a much higher standard. Americans really want to love their president.

MORGAN: It was the hypocrisy. Look at Bill Clinton. He's now one of the most revered and popular ex-presidents in history, and he was a pretty naughty boy as president, you know? I don't think the American public are quite as puritanical towards the people they like as they are to people that maybe they don't like so much.

KELLEY: Like whom?

MORGAN: Eliot Spitzer would come to mind.

KELLEY: That wasn't exactly an affair. That was a business arrangement, right? A little different, I think, but you are right. I think that the public puts a lot of (INAUDIBLE) for those they love.

MORGAN: Let's talk about this book quickly, "Capturing Camelot." This is a guy called Stanley Tretick. He was a sort of official photographer for the Kennedys.

KELLEY: Well, he really wasn't, Piers. He was a real old time photojournalist who had immense access to the Kennedys.

MORGAN: But he wasn't official, then.


MORGAN: They just let him in. KELLEY: They let him in. And they let him in for the reasons we were just talking about. He had a very symbiotic relationship with the Kennedys. He made them look good. And they gave him access.

MORGAN: They understood the power of this kind of image. Some beautiful pictures, a stunning book. Some of these pictures are really so touching, they haven't been seen before, of him with his little son. It's very, very moving.

But it also sends the right image of this great family man, when of course, the reality was pretty different, wasn't it? He was a family man, but he also had lots of time for other families.

KELLEY: That's very true. That is true. But he was a great father.

MORGAN: And a great president, and a brilliant communicator. That's the way it always comes back. It's like with Petraeus. Has the nation lost a brilliant general, a brilliant CIA director, over an affair? Should it matter? People take a moral view. I don't know. It's a difficult call.

Some of my favorite leaders in history, JFK, Clinton -- I'd add Petraeus -

KELLEY: How about Churchill?

MORGAN: I don't think Churchill ever had affairs. No.

KELLEY: Never did.

MORGAN: He drank a lot.

KELLEY: He drank a lot. He was no stranger to Brandy.


MORGAN: Kitty, it's been a pleasure to talk to you. It's called "Capturing Camelot: Stanley Tretick's iconic images of Kennedy." It's a beautiful book. Lovely pictures. Thank you.

KELLEY: Thank you very much.

MORGAN: When we come back, the man who has very strong opinions about just about everything, especially the Petraeus scandal, director Oliver Stone.


DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Don Lemon here in the CNN NEWSROOM. I have a quick update on some top stories for you. Diplomatic efforts are intensifying to put an end to the deadly fighting between Israel and Hamas. But even with international calls for restraint, preparations for an all-out war are taking place. Already, 65 Palestinians and 3 Israelis have been killed in five days of air attacks. Hamas says 10 members of the same family were massacred during an Israeli air strike in Gaza. Israel says it was targeting a top militant.

Air sirens screamed out in Tel Aviv for a third straight day, but two rockets headed for Israel's largest city were intercepted. Dozens more rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel, including one that hit the town of Opachim (ph), injuring an unspecified number of people. Meanwhile, Egypt and President Mohammed Morsi says discussions are under way in Cairo, and Arab League foreign ministers are set to visit Gaza on Tuesday.

After a marathon stay in space, astronaut Sunnita Williams is back on earth. Williams officially handed over command of the International Space Station yesterday, after calling it home for the last four months. She landed in Kazakhstan tonight, along with astronauts from Japan and Russia.

President Barack Obama monitoring the conflict in the Middle East as he travels through Asia. Today in Thailand, he said that the U.S. is working with all parties in the violence. Mr. Obama made history tonight, becoming the first U.S. president to visit Myanmar. The president wraps up his three-nation Asian tour with a stop in Cambodia.

The State Department updating how it deploys security for diplomatic facilities around the globe now. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Defense Department will monitor where forces are deployed so they can travel to help during emergencies if needed. The change comes amid congressional hearings over how the Obama administration handled the security crisis in Benghazi, Libya.

Those are your headlines this hour. I'm Don Lemon. See you back here at 10:00 p.m. Eastern.


MORGAN: Oliver Stone is not exactly the kind of guy who would take anything at face value. He had turned the official story on its head with movies like "JFK" and "Nixon." He has strong feelings about the unfolding Petraeus scandal, too.

In his new project, the book to complement the series, "The Untold History of the United States," he challenges the accepted view of American history. Oliver Stone joins me now.

Welcome back, Oliver.

STONE: Thank you, Piers.

MORGAN: I loved our last encounter. We had to bleep a few of your more outrageous comments, but that's why I enjoyed it. Let's talk about Petraeus. Because unlike many people casting their verdict on him now, you did that before all this came out. And you were pretty scathing about it. Why were you not a fan of General Petraeus?

STONE: Well, the American media has come up with this narrative that he's the American hero who betrayed by the woman. He takes the fall. It's a classic. It sells well. It's a good soap opera. But it's not true. I see no evidence of his heroism.

There has been no success in Iraq. The so-called surge has been overhyped by the media as a success, when, in fact, Iraq was trashed almost from the beginning to the end, and it was in worse shape when he left. He didn't leave it well.

Then when he went to Afghanistan, he -- first of all, he conned Obama into adding 30,000 troops, it was, into Afghanistan, with a plan that he would win with this counter-insurgency program. Where is it? Where are the results? They're nonexistent. Afghanistan is worse off.

He's supervised the Predator explosion and the missiles, and into not only Pakistan and also Afghanistan, and he's exacerbated the entire region. And the people who are there are going to hate us more so for civilian damage, collateral damage.

On top of it, you know, he's built up this reputation. First of all, as a military man, I really think he's overdoing it as a showman, because he goes in front of Congress to talk about the counter- insurgency. He's wearing, if you noticed, the ribbons grow every year. He's got now like a regular fruit salad up here. Amazing amount.

And it's disgusting. General Marshall, who was one of the greatest heroes of World War II, is famous for being a modest man, going in front of Congress and wearing hardly anything. You don't need medals.

MORGAN: He had this reputation of King David.

STONE: Very much so.

MORGAN: A lot of people in the forces -- and they didn't always mean it as a compliment. They meant as he was slightly regal.

STONE: It's success. America values success. What is success in Iraq and Afghanistan? Can you tell me? He's left -- there have been many weeping widows out there. And it's not worked. Counter-insurgency -- our involvement in a foreign country, whether it's Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq one, Iraq two, it doesn't work.

We go in. We have a lot of money. We make a lot of friends, temporary friends. They know we're leaving. And when we leave, which they know we will leave, they value their lives. So they are our temporary friends.

MORGAN: Were you surprised when Petraeus got the CIA job?

STONE: I was worried about it because he's created again -- the military crossing into the CIA is very dangerous. And obviously it's a political job, but he's made it into a paramilitary force. He's adopted the Predator missiles into the CIA. They're using them as drone attacks, as well as the Pentagon.

Who knows what else he's up to. But certainly his whole concept of counter-insurgency violates the sovereignty of every nation on Earth. It's a very dangerous position we're putting ourselves into weapon- wise. We can talk about untold history, where we get into the issue of where we're going, America --


MORGAN: I'll get to that. On Petraeus, when the scandal broke about him having a mistress, is that grounds enough --

STONE: In England, it is.

MORGAN: -- for him to resign?

STONE: In England, it is. Our puritan morality dictates it. Certainly it's not the reasons I would like to see him take a fall. It reminds me of the Monica Lewinsky scandal and stuff like that. It's tabloid stuff. You love that in England.

But here in America, the truth is that he should have been long ago investigated far more severely by our media. And he got a free pass because of the fruit salad and the Congressional -- and in general, the entire American nation, the Congress especially, has caved into this military worship of technology.

I've seen that in the last 20 years grow. In the '90s and the 2000s, we seem to give a pass always to the military. Whenever they want more money, they get a pass.

MORGAN: The sense I get over here about the military is that it's almost impossible to criticize anyone in the military, because there's such patriotism towards it. And I get that. But it is particularly pronounced in America that it is almost seen as utter disloyalty, if not treachery, to criticize any serving military man or woman. That is quite dangerous, isn't it?

STONE: Very dangerous.

MORGAN: Any society.

STONE: You know where it leads to? Rome. Go back to the Roman Empire. The Praetorian Guard became so inflated by budgets, emperors would pay them homage and favors and pay them more money to be loyal to that faction. Eventually the Roman guards, the military became more important than the citizenry.

Of course, they didn't hold up the empire. They are all over the place, but they couldn't hold back the barbarians and so forth. So it doesn't work. You don't bribe the military. Frankly, we could be in a position where if things get more chaotic -- and there could be another terrorist attack and this concept of American security is so violated that the military could act in a very negative way, in an old-fashioned way, to restore order. And you end up with a General Petraeus running the country by certainly a form of dictatorship.

MORGAN: Take a short break. Let's come back and talk about Barack Obama being re-elected, and also historically, where you put him in context in relation to the untold history of the United States and about this fascinating new project you have.

STONE: Well, we deal with --

MORGAN: After the break.




STONE: We live much of our lives in a fog, all of us. But I would like my children to have access to something that looks beyond what I call the tyranny of now. We watch the media. Everyone talks about that thing, the news of the day and all the subconscious, really important stuff that's going on is being neglected.


MORGAN: A new project, "The Untold History of the United States," on Showtime. Back with me now is the one and only Oliver Stone. It's a fascinating project. I will come to that very soon.

I just want to talk to you quickly about Obama who got re- elected. You've been quite critical of him too previously. On balance, are you pleased though that he won the election?

STONE: I'm pleased he won the election. I voted for him. It was a better choice than Romney. But both men are operating inside of the dichotomy where American security is paramount and American empire comes first, and the building up of America's power abroad, influence is the primary objective, which falls into the old concept of American empire, which we've had since 1898, since we went to the Philippines.

And it's gotten worse and worse and worse. And now we just accept it. No one in the argument, in the debate ever questions why we have to have such a big military, why we have to have foreign bases, 800 plus bases, and why we have to -- on top of it, you can talk about what Obama said, that America is the indispensable nation again.

We have heard this rhetoric over the years. It's a very dangerous rhetoric. We're not indispensable. We're not God appointed. We are very -- we should be very humble in the face of the prosperity that we have. But we've used our -- frankly, we've become like the New York Yankees a bit, like a little arrogant. And we're buying what we need. You mentioned Petraeus earlier. I said, maybe the concept of using money in Afghanistan and Iraq to bribe the Sunnis not to join us or to bribe the Shiites to fight -- I mean, it's a dirty thing that we do abroad. And people in America don't know about the dirty wars.

MORGAN: When you research this, how many military conflicts has America been engaged in that you think are justified?

STONE: In terms of conflicts, you mean -- you're talking about little things like Grenada that become big things?


STONE: I think it's about seven or eight major ones, since Vietnam and Korea. Korea was not necessary either. But that's another story. Vietnam starts this beginning of the decline economically in the country and also the infrastructure and the labor markets. The -- how do you say -- where the richest Americans have reached a level which is completely disproportionate to the rest of Americans.

MORGAN: But what was the point of doing this? Why did you want to make this series?

STONE: Boy. It started four and a half years ago. It's the culmination of the themes in my films, because I've been exploring. As I grew up, I found out more about life. I grew up conservative, very Republican. I served in Vietnam, with the belief that I was doing -- fighting communism.

And I saw the repetition of patterns. By the time the 1980s roll around and Reagan comes in and starts talking hostile actions in Central America, and messing with -- interfering with revolutions -- people's revolutions in those countries, I went down there, did a movie called "Salvador." I don't know if you saw it.

MORGAN: Great movie.

STONE: Basically, I saw American troops, just like I had been, a green kid in Vietnam. And I said -- I wondered -- I asked the kids, do you remember Vietnam? They literally said to me, no, I really don't know what happened in Vietnam. The history of Vietnam has been denied to them.

MORGAN: I think it's a fascinating history lesson, because you tell it so vividly. Not just your narration, which is a very interesting way of doing it, but the images that you use, the video you use makes it a compelling history lesson.

STONE: By the way, it's --

MORGAN: That's why I would urge people to watch it, because you will learn about these events, even if you don't necessarily agree with your take on it.

STONE: That's true. I learned a lot. And we don't want to make it didactic. You see, kids are bored with history because they think they know at the end. I don't agree. I don't think we know the end. I think the story that is untold -- because World War II, we started tonight, chapter one, World War II. We see it from three sides, Britain, Russia, the U.S.

It's a whole other ball game when you look at three interests, you look at it through other eyes, Russian eyes, English eyes, Chinese eyes.

If you can see history, have empathy for others, other than yourself, you broaden your compassion. And you broaden. And we become a member of the world, of the global community. And this is what Obama has not done.

Now he's basically operating as an outlier now. You asked about our criticism of him. Our criticism is couched in the context of 120 years of history. We started in 1900. We end now. That's a lot.

And we start -- we mentioned Woodrow Wilson, World War I, saying America is the savior of the world, if you remember after Versailles. So we show that this mission to be a global policeman starts a long time ago. But it certainly grows dangerous after the atomic bomb in 1945.

MORGAN: It's a fascinating project. Thoroughly enjoyed the book. It's a riveting history lesson. You bring this stuff to life. I commend you for it. Oliver, good to see you again.

STONE: Thank you, Piers.

MORGAN: "The Untold History of the United States" airs on Showtime. The book is available now. A thumping good read it is, too.

When we come back, Bond, James Bond. Sir Roger Moore. Why he says Daniel Craig is the best 007 ever.



MOORE: My name's Bond, James Bond.


MORGAN: And that is Moore, Sir Roger Moore, playing the iconic British agent in "Live and Let Die," his first movie as Bond. Moore defined the dashing role in seven of the movies. Sir Roger, it is a great honor to have you in my studio, I must say.

MOORE: Piers, very nice to see you again. But please, call me Roger.

MORGAN: I can't. Americans wouldn't stand for it. Now, you appeared in seven of the Bond movies. And yet, I heard you in an interview earlier today saying that you felt "Skyfall," the new Daniel Craig movie, is the best Bond movie you have seen it.

MOORE: Well, it is. Certainly the box office proves it in Europe. It is -- actually, I think what I said this morning was that I finished this book, "Bond on Bond," about four, five months ago. Before it went to press, I would have loved to have seen "Skyfall," because I would have put another chapter in.

MORGAN: You thought it was really good?

MOORE: I think he is tremendous. And it's a great film. Wonderful director, Sam Mendes.

MORGAN: Let's watch a clip from "Skyfall." Here.


MORGAN: He does a lot of his own stunts, apparently. You never did that, did you?

MOORE: I did a couple of the love scenes.


MOORE: Well, that's stunts (ph).

MORGAN: I always think with all the Bonds, Sean Connery would win a fight, if you all went into a bar and a big fight broke out, Sean Connery would probably be the hardest. I think that you, though, you would pull the most women. I think they would gravitate to that little twinkling, raised eyebrow.

MOORE: I always said that Sean was a killer and I was a lover. But I now say that Daniel Craig is the real killer.

MORGAN: Of all the Bond girls, and there were so many, especially in the seven movies you made, if I could trap you on a desert island with one of them, and I know it is like choosing your favorite baby, but if I can put you on an island for the rest of your life with one Bond girl, who would it be?

MOORE: I'd actually go with my wife.

MORGAN: That is a complete copout, Sir Roger. And you are only doing that because she's watching this.

MOORE: She may not be watching it because I can make sure she doesn't.

MORGAN: Let me rephrase. If it was with your wife's permission --

MOORE: If it was -- .


MORGAN: Which I know is highly unlikely.

MOORE: It would have to be one of the Swedish ladies, particularly like Maude Adams.

MORGAN: Really?

MOORE: I can say "I love you" in Swedish.

MORGAN: Being James Bond, there are two of the most exclusive boys clubs in the world. One is surviving, living presidents of the United States, there are five of them, and all six men who played Bond are still alive. You, Sean Connery, Daniel Craig, Timothy Dalton, Piers Brosnan, and the one everyone forgets, George Lazenby.

MOORE: You call this a living?

MORGAN: What is it like to be James Bond? I mean, to walk around with people knowing you're Bond?

MOORE: But you get sort of used to it after you have said, "my name is Bond, James Bond" 400 times.

MORGAN: Do people make you still say that?

MOORE: Oh, yes, always.

MORGAN: Everywhere you go?

MOORE: Every interview.

MORGAN: How many women do you think you have seduced because you played James Bond in the last 50 years?

MOORE: Been married four times.


MORGAN: The mere fact you've been married four times, Sir Roger, suggests that --


MORGAN: You had a way with the ladies over the years.

MOORE: Well, I've -- I'm very -- I find it very difficult to say no.

MORGAN: You also married very volatile women. It seemed like every time you got out of the fire, you put yourself straight back into the frying pan

MOORE: It's not quite true. It's just that I am one of those people that I don't argue. It annoys, I think, ladies, if you don't answer back.

MORGAN: So you always just this nice, calm figure?

MOORE: I try to be. Inside, I'm churning. I have to take Nexium every morning for my stomach.

MORGAN: Have you been what British people would describe as a bit of a naughty boy over the years, would you say?

MOORE: Depends what the definition of naughty is.

MORGAN: What would your definition be?

MOORE: I suppose getting drunk, falling over and waking up in strange hotel rooms. With people you wonder who they are?


MORGAN: Do you have any regrets in your 85 years?

MOORE: I regret I can't start them all again. MORGAN: Really? I always get the feeling with you -- you seem really -- a very self-aware man who has really enjoyed his life. For all the good and bad stuff that's happened, primarily you've enjoyed your life.

MOORE: I've been terribly lucky. And I don't know why. Why I should have been selected to be -- have sort of the luck shine upon them. But I always kept working. I sort of had some many happy moments.

MORGAN: The book is fascinating and it goes back over the 50 years of Bond movies. Are you surprised that the Bond franchise is still so successful?

MOORE: You didn't hold that book up high enough.

MORGAN: Sorry, Sir Roger. There we are.


MOORE: "Bond on Bond."

MORGAN: Are you surprised that it still -- I mean, even more successful than it was 50 years ago?

MOORE: No, not really. Because I know that they've never cheated the audiences. They spend the money, put it on the screen. And in the days when Bond started, you must remember, the travel was very expensive. So people didn't go to all those places. They would see it along the screen, transported into a little bit of heaven, if you like. But they saw things they didn't see in their everyday life. And then you mix that up with beautiful girls, a great adventure, the old hero story, the white knight.

MORGAN: We just heard the presidential election here. Did you take much interest in that?

MOORE: An election, really? Well, of course, we are always curious.

MORGAN: You a fan of Barack Obama?

MOORE: I'm not going to answer anything political.

MORGAN: Really?

MOORE: Because I work with UNICEF and you're not allowed with the United Nations.

MORGAN: I think whatever you think of Obama domestically in America, and obviously the opinion is divided, and half the country nearly in the popular vote didn't vote for him, but I think abroad Obama has definitely restored a lot of America's reputation. That's the sense I get. Do you feel that when you travel the world?

MOORE: Yes, I think that he, like Reagan, makes an American proud to be an American. MORGAN: Yes. I totally agree. If I could give you five minutes back of your entire life, and it can't involve marriage or children to relive, the greatest moment of your life, what would you choose?

MOORE: I suppose being with my parents when I did something that was worthwhile.

MORGAN: Getting their love and respect?


MORGAN: What do you think they would have made of the way you ended up?

MOORE: Well, my mother would be very grateful, because she always said, don't you think you should get a regular job, son?


MORGAN: Your dad was a policeman. What would he have made of it?

MOORE: He was very happy. If it hadn't been for them, I couldn't have been an actor. They had to support me while I was studying. Studying, you know, when I was abroad, during the war. (INAUDIBLE). There were 16 girls and four boys in each class.

MORGAN: That's basically been the story of your life ever since, isn't it, Sir Roger?

MOORE: Outnumbered.

MORGAN: Well, I can talk to you all day, as you know. It's been a fascinating encounter. Is the way I'd best describe this. "Bond on Bond, Reflections on 50 Years of James Bond Movies." The great Sir Roger Moore. Flying the flag for Britain around the world, with UNICEF and everything else. It's been a real honor.

MOORE: Thank you so much.

MORGAN: Lovely to see you.

MOORE: Thank you.

MORGAN: Roger Moore, a true legend. And we'll be right back.



WANDA BUTTS, CHAMPIONING CHILDREN: Josh went to spend the night with friends. I had no clue they were coming to Bird Lake (ph). Right about here is where Josh was, when the raft capsized and he went down. Very hard for me to believe that just like that, my son had drowned and he was gone.

My father, he instilled in us the fear of water, and so I in turn didn't take my son around water.

Children don't have to drown.

My name is Wanda Butts. I save lives by providing swimming lessons and water safety skills.

Jacob Kendrick--

African-American children are three times more likely to drown than white children. That's why we started the Josh Project, to educate families about the importance of being water safe.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Take the ring and throw it right at the victim.

BUTTS: Many parents, they don't know how to swim.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was afraid of the water. He was the first in my family to learn how to swim. He's come a long way from not liking water in his face, to getting dunked under.

BUTTS: You like it? All right.

I'm so happy to see that so many of them have learned how to swim. Good job! That's one life we saved.

It takes me back to Josh and how the tragedy was turned into triumph, and it makes me happy. All right.