CNN- David, you worked for four American presidents. The tone that President Obama sets today on this, the few days after bin Laden has been killed, is very, very important, because you don't want to be overtly political on such a sensitive day.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: And not overtly celebratory either. And so I think the wreath-laying is meant to convey very much a sense of dignity and honor, that the president -- it's a quieter ceremony than perhaps we would have expected.
We all remember, Wolf, how George W. Bush went there just after 9/11, and famously was so defiant. And when people yelled at him, "We can't hear you, Mr. President!" firemen and policemen, he yelled back, "But I can hear you, and so can all of America!"
And that was a moment in which we had to rally people and sort of come together and fight this terrorism. And now, President Obama comes a decade later, after a decade of war, to the most important shrine we have to the beginning of this war. 9/11, this site is almost to America now what Pearl Harbor is to our national memories.
And I'm Wolf Blitzer, here in Washington, D.C.
President Obama's visit comes just six days of he ordered the raid that killed the al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the architect of the terrorist attacks.
We're standing by. The president, right now, is inside a fire station. He's having lunch with firefighters.
He will then leave there. Rudy Giuliani, the former of New York City, who was the mayor on 9/11, he's joined the president. He's there with the president right now.
The president will go lay a wreath at a memorial at Ground Zero, and then he will meet privately with family members, survivors of some of those killed on 9/11.
Our senior political analyst David Gergen is joining us now from Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was an adviser to former Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton.
Take us inside a White House on a day like this. And it's an extraordinary day. Since the death of bin Laden, it's been an extraordinary several days.
David, take us inside the decision-making process that leads a president to make this decision to go to New York.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, Wolf, much of the focus in the White House, of course, almost the complete focus, was trying to get bin Laden. And that was an enormously complicated 24 interagency meetings, no leaks, a lot of discipline showed. But then there comes a time once you get the objective, or something really happens inside a White House, you begin to asking yourself, OK, how can we properly commemorate this moment? What's the right way to do it?
And coming to this site, 9/11, again, so analogous to going to Pearl Harbor and remembering World War II and remembering those veterans, this was a way for the president to say, we keep our promises. We promised we'd remember you, and we're doing that. But just as important for this White House, Wolf, as you know, has been a sense that getting bin Laden was about keeping a promise to the world that we would do justice, that we would seek justice as we would not let him go unpunished. And what's in the White House right now is a very quiet sense of satisfaction that we have sent a message that we will keep our promises, we will be persistent, and we have the reach and capability to keep our promises. They think that's a very important message to send to the Middle East and against al Qaeda all around the world.
BLITZER: And we're looking at these live pictures from the site. Security, obviously, very intense. We see some family members there getting ready.
The president will be going there. He'll be laying this wreath, as we've been saying.
President Obama's visit comes just six days of he ordered the raid that killed the al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the architect of the terrorist attacks.
We're standing by. The president, right now, is inside a fire station. He's having lunch with firefighters.
He will then leave there. Rudy Giuliani, the former of New York City, who was the mayor on 9/11, he's joined the president. He's there with the president right now.
The president will go lay a wreath at a memorial at Ground Zero, and then he will meet privately with family members, survivors of some of those killed on 9/11.
Our senior political analyst David Gergen is joining us now from Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was an adviser to former Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton.
Take us inside a White House on a day like this. And it's an extraordinary day. Since the death of bin Laden, it's been an extraordinary several days.
David, take us inside the decision-making process that leads a president to make this decision to go to New York.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, Wolf, much of the focus in the White House, of course, almost the complete focus, was trying to get bin Laden. And that was an enormously complicated 24 interagency meetings, no leaks, a lot of discipline showed. But then there comes a time once you get the objective, or something really happens inside a White House, you begin to asking yourself, OK, how can we properly commemorate this moment? What's the right way to do it?
And coming to this site, 9/11, again, so analogous to going to Pearl Harbor and remembering World War II and remembering those veterans, this was a way for the president to say, we keep our promises. We promised we'd remember you, and we're doing that. But just as important for this White House, Wolf, as you know, has been a sense that getting bin Laden was about keeping a promise to the world that we would do justice, that we would seek justice as we would not let him go unpunished. And what's in the White House right now is a very quiet sense of satisfaction that we have sent a message that we will keep our promises, we will be persistent, and we have the reach and capability to keep our promises. They think that's a very important message to send to the Middle East and against al Qaeda all around the world.
BLITZER: And we're looking at these live pictures from the site. Security, obviously, very intense. We see some family members there getting ready.
The president will be going there. He'll be laying this wreath, as we've been saying.
Talk a little bit, David, about the decision to have Rudy Giuliani, the mayor -- the former mayor of New York, join the president inside that fire station right now. He received the president when he landed aboard Marine One in lower Manhattan and he's with him right now. This is something important, especially because the former president, George W. Bush, who was invited, decided not to go right now.
GERGEN: That's a very important point, Wolf. And they would have liked to have George W. Bush there, but they certainly understand, I think everybody understands, the Bush tradition, as you know so well. The Bush father and son both believe we only have one president at a time. And he'll come back in September for the 10th anniversary. But this was President Obama's moment. He was the one who got him, in effect.
But beyond that, Rudy Giuliani, you know, helps to bring it back full circle, because he became the face of 9/11 of a defiant America, of a America that was courageous in the face of adversity. And his leadership in that moment, you know, this Churchillian quality that he showed, was something that was so important to rally the United States in 9/11, and the leadership he showed once it followed. He never made it to the presidency, but he'll always be remembered, as John King said earlier, as America's mayor.
BLITZER: He certainly will. America's mayor, indeed. Rudy Giuliani, appropriate for him to be with the president of the United States in Manhattan right now.
David, where do you think this story of Osama bin Laden, of the killing of him, goes? Because, I mean, over the last several days, it has evolved, questions have been raised. Do you think that continues or do you think after today people start to move on or -- and not sort of pursue the details so much?
GERGEN: Well, Anderson, we -- the president is going to Kentucky tomorrow, as you know, and to thank the troops. And that's also going to be an important day.
But I've been wondering the same thing you have, because there have been so many -- there's been this sort of storm of questions, second guessing so many aspects of Sunday night since Sunday. And yet today is bringing us back, doesn't it, to the importance of what happened and how we're bringing, perhaps to an end, 10 years of warfare and how important the killing of bin Laden has been.
I think today has been one which the president is succeeding at the call he made on Sunday night. At first when he said it, I wasn't sure it would ring true, but I think it is now, and that is his call for national unity. His visit to New York seems to me to -- and reaching out to the firefighters and the police and doing so well with the families is deepening the sense of unity, you know, and hopefully prolonging it. And I think that maybe it will override some of these -- the questioning, the carping that we've seen in the last few days.
So I think it's a really good question, will this now change the tone back to -- and put us back on a higher level? I hope so.
COOPER: Now, John King, what do you think?
KING: I think that the tone in Washington will change, but not for long because of the substance and the profound disagreements over the issues to come. However, if there's more of a sense of respect and a sense of community heading into those debates, maybe they'll be more civil.
I do think to your point about will there be more questions asked about the specifics of the operation? Of course there will be. I do think, though, that for those especially here and the families, you're hearing more of the pain today, the personal -- there's many chapters in what we now call the war on terror. There are 100,000 troops still in Afghanistan. Al Zawahiri, the number two, is still out there. Al Awaki, the al Qaeda in the Arabian peninsula, has emerged. An American, a 40-year-old American could be the global face of terrorism right now. Those narratives will continue. But I do think that wreath laying is the final page in the hunt for bin Laden chapter. The personal part of it.
GERGEN: Well, Anderson, we -- the president is going to Kentucky tomorrow, as you know, and to thank the troops. And that's also going to be an important day.
But I've been wondering the same thing you have, because there have been so many -- there's been this sort of storm of questions, second guessing so many aspects of Sunday night since Sunday. And yet today is bringing us back, doesn't it, to the importance of what happened and how we're bringing, perhaps to an end, 10 years of warfare and how important the killing of bin Laden has been.
I think today has been one which the president is succeeding at the call he made on Sunday night. At first when he said it, I wasn't sure it would ring true, but I think it is now, and that is his call for national unity. His visit to New York seems to me to -- and reaching out to the firefighters and the police and doing so well with the families is deepening the sense of unity, you know, and hopefully prolonging it. And I think that maybe it will override some of these -- the questioning, the carping that we've seen in the last few days.
So I think it's a really good question, will this now change the tone back to -- and put us back on a higher level? I hope so.
COOPER: Now, John King, what do you think?
KING: I think that the tone in Washington will change, but not for long because of the substance and the profound disagreements over the issues to come. However, if there's more of a sense of respect and a sense of community heading into those debates, maybe they'll be more civil.
I do think to your point about will there be more questions asked about the specifics of the operation? Of course there will be. I do think, though, that for those especially here and the families, you're hearing more of the pain today, the personal -- there's many chapters in what we now call the war on terror. There are 100,000 troops still in Afghanistan. Al Zawahiri, the number two, is still out there. Al Awaki, the al Qaeda in the Arabian peninsula, has emerged. An American, a 40-year-old American could be the global face of terrorism right now. Those narratives will continue. But I do think that wreath laying is the final page in the hunt for bin Laden chapter. The personal part of it.
-Partial transcript from CNN's special coverage today -