if hp security solutions can help keep the world's largest organizations safe, they can keep yours safe, too. make it matter. this week on the journal editorial report, isis on the march as islamic state fighters make alarming gains. new questions about president obama's plan to degrade and destroy the terror group. plus, as more than a dozen states brace for policy cancellations, will obama care take center stage in the final weeks of the midterm campaign? and blue state blues, why some incumbent democratic governors are in the fight of their political lives. welcome to "the journal editorial report." i'm paul gigot.

as islamic state militants made alarming gains in syria and western iraq, secretary of state john kerry defended the strategy wednesday suggesting that protecting the town of kobani was not a priority of the u.s. led coalition. >> notwithstanding the crisis in kobani, the original targets of our efforts have been the command and control centers and infrastructure, we're trying to deprive the isil of the overall ability, not just in kobani but throughout syria and into iraq. >> joining the panel this week, wall street journal columnist dan henninger, brett stevens and editorial board member, matt kaminsky. what do you make of john kerry's explanation for why we're doing so little to stop the assault?

>> they have given up and trying to explain themselves but it really won't fly. this is going to be a very major below to american credibility above all. >> why. >> because we have committed the greatest military in the world to destroying isis, since that happened four weeks ago, disis continued its march in iraq but taking over a really important town on the turkish border. >> kobani is in syria. >> it is. it will be again a coup for isis, to show they can stand up to the super power and take it down. >> but it's not -- there's symbolic element -- >> i agree with everything he said, there's also a political element which is that if we are going to succeed without putting major forces on ground, we need the help of the kurdish allies. the peshmerga is the force on the ground and this is sending a

message that we really don't have their back, that we are not going to be their firm alies. >> why is turkey, they've got tanks on the border, troops are there, very powerful military. why are they not doing anything? >> in large part because the turkish foreign minister said we're not committing ground troops to kobani on our own. shorthand for saying, look, united states if we're not going on the ground we're not going on the ground. we're not going to get hung out there by ourselves. that reflect the basis thing we've been talking about. the united states has half a strategy in iraq and syria. they are not acting as though they are committed to fully defeating isis, that was clear from what secretary kerry was saying, a very confused statement. >> we want the united states to take down assad in syria and

want a buffer zone inside syria so the refugees can stay there protected rather than have to flow into turkey. don't they have a point? and why do we have this quite unseemly for a coalition, fighting back and forth? >> it is but this goes back years over the u.s. and president obama and most and actually all of america's allies in the middle east. since 2011, they've called on the u.s. to intervene in syria against the assad regime. we're finally acting now but we're not acting against the assad regime but isis, why not assad? syria will not be solved unless assad is toppled. >> of course. we're not going to be able to generate a sunni opposition if we're hitting isis and allowing assad to gain that way. with the turks, there's a cynical element to what they are

doing. turkey has a large kurdish minority population of its own and had to deal with kurdish terrorist groups for many years. and there's a view in turkey that this destruction of another kurdish enclave solves a problem for them, basically diminishes a kurdish threat. >> the administration would say, look, yeah, this is limited, john kerry said, we're not going all in. we're going to degrade and destroy, we're not -- and if we follow your strategy, we'll be dragged into gradual escalation and before you know it, we'll have ten thousand troops on the ground. >> even at that level, degrade, perhaps, destroy, not even close. let me give you a perfect example this week. the syrian kurds in kobani, standing up to is sis, say this is city fighting we need heavy weaponry, we don't have it. they do. similarly, we would not arm the free syrian army three years ago

when we knew who they were. >> so we have just gone and with half measures and not to win. >> what's the response to the limited war point? >> we are not degrading them. they are winning. if they are winning, we are not degrading them. what we are doing is adding a propaganda victory to the strategic and military victories they are already gaining by saying not only have we consolidated our control over northern syria, our consolidating over an bar province but doing so in the teeth of american military -- >> are we going to be therefore facing a choice of either escalating this effort or essentially seeing it fail? >> i think the problem is the less we do now, the more we'll inevitably have to do. this is in response to the escalation argument, not doing it properly now is setting us up for trouble down the road. >> do you agree with that? >> of course, this is the

tragedy of the entire -- if we maintained a trip wire presence of 10 or 15,000 troops we would not have the isis crisis we have now. if we had gone in early, they wouldn't have gotten this strong. we're building our way up the ladder of chaos. >> pleasant message, thank you. when we come back, just in time for the mid terms, the largest retailer announces health insurance cuts and residents in more than a dozen states brace for policy cancellations. so is obama care about to make a return to the campaign trail? your customers, our financing. your aspirations, our analytics. your goals, our technology. introducing synchrony financial, bringing new meaning to the word partnership. banking. loyalty. analytics.

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more than a dozen states plan to cancel health care plans not in compliance with the affordable care act in the coming weeks. in virginia alone, a quarter of a million plans are set to be eliminated putting obama care back on the front burner in the

campaign's final weeks. that news comes as walmart says it's dropping benefits for 30,000 part-time workers citing higher than anticipated health care cost. joe rago and kim straussel join me with more. joe, let's start with the walmart decision, they were a big supporter of the law in 2009. now it says it can't afford to pay health insurance for its workers? >> right, i mean, they endorse this law saying it would bring down health care costs now here they are saying, we've got a big problem here. we're going to dump all of our part-time workers. what they are really doing is they are responding to the laws, which is for industries like retail with large numbers of low wage and low skilled workers, the exchanges, insurance exchanges are designed for that industry. >> is this widespread beyond

walmart? >> absolutely. >> who else is doing? >> home depot, target, trader joe's, other grocery stores. hospitality industry, seasonal industry like ski mountains. >> you're talking about potentially millions of people here? >> no question. >> a lot of people look at walma walmart, that's great, they'll be on the changes, that's going to be more customers for the insurers to come in so this is a good thing for the reform. >> if you're pro-government health care, of course this is a good thing. >> because taxpayers will be paying for these new customers. >> right, of course that's a good thing. if you think that government should provide health care to everybody. >> larger taxpayer burden? >> absolutely, no question. >> all right, kim, what about the cancellations here that are going on in these states, including your state of

virginia? what's behind that? >> well, democrats have benefited from a lull pretty much since the blowup of the health care.gov website. we're hearing there are a least 12 states, potentially more, that are going to be cutting these health insurance plans, canceling them because they no long comply with obamacare requirements. this is happening -- we're talking about hundreds and thousands of people and interestingly, many of them in states where there are really competitive elections going on. so places like north carolina, kentucky, alaska, colorado and as you mentioned, virginia we're up to a quarter million people may be losing their policies. >> i thought this was supposed to have been settled last year, you had the initial transition, going from the preobama care policies to obamacare policies and compliance. now we're a year into this and they are hitting again. why? >> to solve the political problem, last year they created

all kinds of regulatory defehrments. >> administration? >> health and human services administration and particularly the white house. what they said was, if your policy is going to be canceled, you can do it a year later or two years later. now that's kind of catching up with them. >> that's what we're seeing now is this next wave. and what share of these cancellations will happen before the election and what after? >> most of them before they've got to announce it by november 1st. so everything is going to happen right before the election. >> all right, kim, let's talk about the role that obamacare is playing in the election. you said cancellations happening in states where they have competitive elections but republicans were saying a few months back that obama care was their killer issue, they are really going to run on this number one issue. democrats saying we don't see any signs preventing republicans

from backing down. it's really been neutralized. what's the truth here? >> so, what you have is a lot of republicans who still running ads and outside conservative groups running ads in states. are people a little burnt out on this issue? that's why this really matters. when you have a senator like kay hagen in north carolina and commercials of her saying if you like your health care plan, you can keep it, which she said many times. now suddenly, there's going to be another wave of thousands of people in her state who lost the health care plan and has the potential to super charge it. one more thing too, we have another controversy coming up too, the fact the administration has got all of the rates it is going to put out for the next wave of plans. they are sitting on them. this is becoming a bit of a news story as well. they don't want to release them before people go to the polls and this is also cropping up as an issue in the states too. >> briefly, is obamacare still a net plus for republicans in this

election or not? >> it absolutely is. there are a lot of americans who simply are unhappy over it. it may not be the thing they are fuming over but it is baked into their disaffection with current members -- >> when we come back, blue state blues democratic governors are in the fight of their political lives this election season. we'll tell you why and which races to watch next.

less than a month until election day and incumbent governors are fighting for their political lives. we look at the democrats facing uphill re-election battles in colorado and connecticut and deep fblue state of illinois

where pat quinn called in the big guns with michelle obama to stump, with political newcomer bruce rauner. so, dan, these are not right wing states. these have had democratic governors for a while most voted for president obama. what's going on? >> i think something is going on in all of the states that we even blue states cannot pull themselves out of the real world. the real world right now suggests that there's a lot of economic anxiety in the united states. and those blue states like illinois, connecticut and massachusetts are in big economic trouble. the second thing that's going on is barack obama's unpopularity. it has shown to be a factor in almost all these states, note that barack obama was not in illinois, his wife was in illinois. >> even states that voted for

him, there's a real undertoe from the president. >> independent voters who generally turn out in midterm elections have been trending towards the republicans, even in these blue states. you get a governor like pat quinn whose strategy is to romneyize his opponent. >> rich guy, doesn't understand middle class but doesn't want to talk about the bad state of illinois. >> corporate tax rate, 9.5%, fourth highest in the country, subpar income growth. the question is how can this guy win? he's really got a record here that is one of the worst -- >> he's in big trouble, companies are migrating out of illinois and people know it. >> let's talk about new england, joe, that's supposed to be bas c basically a foreign country for republicans yet they are supposed to -- they are competitive in massachusetts governor's race, very competent tif in economic and may pick up house seats. what's going on?

>> one thing, if you look at connecticut, worst state for economic growth in the country, dan malloy running for re-election, he has passed the largest tax increase in connecticut history. >> which is saying a lot. absolutely. and so you look at what is essentially a failed state. dan malloy is pushing for a hedge fund tax, basically the last industry left in connecticut. and same thing in massachusetts. >> that's an open seat, no incumbent. >> right, you've got coakley. >> martha coakley attorney general running for governor. >> she's the democrat. >> she's the democrat running against charlie baker, former ceo of harvard pilgrim, which is a health insurance company, turned that around.

health care costs have really become a big issue in massachusetts. about 60% of all health care in the state is financed by the government increasingly -- increasing rapidly and so he's really pushing her on that. >> charlie baker saying, i'm the guy that can come in and do something about it. >> let's turn to colorado, john hicken looper was a rising democratic star, passed gun control legislation and suddenly fighting for his life against bob beauprez. >> this is a state that democrats nonetheless felt it was marching towards their column and they got this governor who claimed to be a centrist, very high approval ratings the problem for john hickenlooper he has taken some decisions andal allied himself with the liberal wing of his

party. you're seeing a backlash among voters. he signed on with the very controversial gun control measures and death penalty has become an issue because he granted a stay of execution for a very controversial figure there. there's a lot of frustration too that he has not taken a stronger stand on what could be the biggest economic driver in colorado, which is fracking. he's tried to play both sides of the field there and people want someone a little more decisive in terms of better jobs and growth. >> right, the fossil fuel drilling, including for natural gas is one of the issues that divides the democratic coalit n coalition, so he's been on the fence. i want to ask why the governors are struggling but not new york and california governors also incumbents and particularly in new york. the economic record is almost as dreadful as connecticut's? >> part of it is they are a very strong candidates running against them in these states.

so you have bob beauprez in colorado and these others you mentioned. that's a big defining difference. >> much more expensive states to get competitive because they are so large. we have to take one more break. when we come back, hits and misses of the week.

time for hits and misses of the week. kim, start us off. >> a hit to canadian prime minister steven harper for sending the obama administration a message. the u.s. has been snubbing canada for six years over the keystone pipe line now it comes news it is developing its own pipe line to its own refinery. mr. harper recently told business leaders he thinks the united states won't be a forecast growing economy for years and canada should change the entire mindset about even doing business with us. when you've lost canada, you've got a problem. >> you sure do. they are out beating us on

economic policy. >> miss to all women's college in california which this week pulled an invitation for conservative columnist george will to appear at the program at xrips which is designed to bring alternative viewpoints to scripps because this lieads to better educational experience. a column earlier this summer, the stance towards limited government and cultural common sense is making itself ludicrous. >> this is a -- people who kidnap all of the woman, they are stale on the rampage. they burned down 180 christian churches with the killing that goes with it. boko haram, the fight is not only in iraq, it is elsewhere in

the world. >> thanks to all of you for watching, i'm paul gigot. hope to see you here next week. u.s. forces hoping to stop a massacre with fresh air strikes overnight and today. the pivotal syrian border town of kobani is on the age of falling into terrorist hands. kurdish militia putting up an offense and the battle of baghdad is under way, isis militants are closing within miles of the airport there and launching hit-and-run attacks against iraqi troops in a suburb of the capital. good afternoon, welcome to america's news headquarters. >> hello arthel and e