News I'm watching, thinking about

There was a very intriguing interview with former Secretary of State Colin Powell on Larry King Monday, Nov. 15.

It will be worth your time to watch it.

Some highlights: Obama should've focused on economy before health care before anything else. President is doing a good job on economy but hasn't communicated it very well.

Powell says he's a moderate Republican, which means for small government, strong national defense and help the people who need help as much as is necessary.

We need to provide Pakistan more help, more tools to root out Taliban. Afghanistan President is increasingly in a tough spot. Bin Laden may be alive, but he's not operating as normal, he's hiding, so he can't be anywhere near as effective as he was when he orchestrated 9/11 attacks.

When King asked Powell if he was ticked by being misled about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, he gave a mad-as-hell sounding "yes." But said many, many intelligence agencies were saying it was true and he spent 4-days at CIA headquarters going over the information, asking questions about its veracity every way he could.

Asked if he's talked to Rumsfeld or Cheney lately, he simply said "No," abruptly ending answer. King chuckled and said "Well said."

Powell said new Republicans are kidding themselves if they think they can balance the budget without raising some kind of revenue. He noted they're asked often what they would cut and no one can come up with the answers.

King suggested others were pushing Powell to become Obama's chief of staff, to which Powell said, "I haven't been asked and I don't want to work in the government. I worked in the government for 40 years" etc..But he did say, when the president asks, you have to at least listen.