So I understand that at some point in the recent past, Trump ordered a cruise missile strike on some person/people/thing in Syria. Because the Syrian guy used chemical weapons on some person/people/thing – if it seems I haven’t exhaustively studied the topic, you have the right impression. As far as I’m concerned the whole middle east – hey, Trump! – would be a great place for a big wall. But I don’t randomly lob artillery shells at my neighbors when they annoy me, and (aside from my lack of acknowledged artillery) there’s a good reason for that.
Hey, remember Obama’s “red line” in Syria? The one that was supposed to keep Assad from breaking out the Zyklon-B whenever things didn’t go his way? It was a stupid thing for Obama to have said if he didn’t mean it, stupider yet if he did, and the conservatives used it as a talking point for months.
If fact, they still do. Because the conservatives, God help them, have not yet figured out that even though Trump did them the service of beating Hillary, he’s not their guy and they’re not obligated to rush to his defense. And so we get ‘reasoning’ of this inferior sort…
Obama’s infamous “red line” basically forced the President’s hand on this since the use of gas cannot be normalized.
No, it didn’t. If I’m a manager in a company and I threaten to fire everybody in my department if they cross some dumb “red line,” and they cross it and I blink, that doesn’t obligate my successor to do anything but not follow my stupid example in future. But the conservatives still seem to think they’ve got this bromance with Trump, and still feel the need to support/defend him by any stupid means at their disposal. When they figure out (the glaringly obvious fact that) he’s not that into them, it’s gonna get ugly for a while.
There are still a lotta people who don’t understand that the vote wasn’t for Trump, it was for “NOT HILLARY!!!
Hmm. So what if the “red line” for the previous manager was “don’t sexually assault the female employees,” then he blinked and didn’t do anything, which actually emboldened the turds in the population? Wouldn’t you fell just a teensy bit obligated? [Oops, sorry — didn’t mean to bring Fox News into this.]
Don’t get me wrong — I wish Trump would’ve pulled every troop out of the Mideast on January 21st; but I also tend to agree with the inferior reasoning cited. The only reason Assad would gas some folks (with Putin’s quiet assent, I’m sure) was to test Trump to see if he was as empty a suit as Obama. Turns out, not so much.
So I don’t have much of a problem with lighting up some of Assad’s toys as an answer to the pop quiz. Extra points for saying it was unacceptable the next day without any sanctimonious blather or promises, then simply crapping on Assad’s Air Force the day after that.
I do get that it’s not technically any of our business, even though we’ve been d*cking around with this part of the world for decades, and pretty much sired most of the current crises.
The perfect follow up (although I know it’s fantasy) would be for Trump to tell the UN that they can either step up and actually do something about this murderous regime — instead of forming a committee to consider the possibility of negotiating a strongly worded memo — or relocate elsewhere by the end of the month.
Cheers
I would also note that ChiCom One was with President Trump in Mar-a-Lago last night, and in the middle of their talks, President Trump excused himself, went on TV to announce the strike, and then went back to continue talking with ChiCom One.
Do you think that might have made an impression on Red China???
Niccolò Machiavelli wrote in chapter 3 of The Prince…
The Romans never allowed a trouble spot to remain simply to avoid going to war over it, because they knew that wars don’t just go away, they are only postponed to someone else’s advantage. Therefore, they made war with Philip and Antiochus in Greece, in order not to have to fight them in Italy… They never went by that saying which you constantly hear from the wiseacres of our day, that time heals all things. They trusted rather their own character and prudence — knowing perfectly well that time contains the seeds of all things, good as well as bad.
Ask yourself this, what kind of world would it be today if America had minded it’s own business and refused to be brought into WW2 on the allied side? After all it was a Europe/Asia issue not an American one.
My post wasn’t about anything happening in Syria. I don’t know any more about what really goes on in Syria than you guys do, which is to say that I know nothing. I’ve been working in the yard, I haven’t even heard the news on the radio this morning, but let me guess: Rush and Sean and Mark claim Trump used cruise missiles in *precision strikes* that destroyed all of Assad’s chemical weapon capability and only hurt bad people and a passing goat, thus upholding American power in the region and giving the Russians the biggest black eye they’ve had since Operation Barbarossa. Right? Amiright?
Right. You may believe as much of that as you like. Tomorrow it’ll turn out the ‘chemical weapons plant’ was nefariously located under a wedding party (comprised entirely of terrorists, thank god) but by then the gasbags will be back to shouting about Judge What’shisname.
No. My point was about conservatives desperately clinging to the fantasy that Trump is their guy. He’s going to go from big to bigger in his efforts to disabuse them of that, but they won’t see it until he’s actually caught in bed with Susan Rice, or campaigns for Chelsea Clinton or something.
Ask yourself this, what kind of world would it be today if America had minded it’s own business and refused to be brought into WW2 on the allied side? After all it was a Europe/Asia issue not an American one.”
Difference being, of course, that Syria hasn’t bombed us, nor used their extensive submarine fleet to sink our shipping.
That said, I firmly believe we should NOT be sticking our whoozits in the fan over there.
Kentucky you are right, Syria hasn’t bombed the United states.
Prior to America’s entry into the second world war American policy was to sit back and do nothing. For over two years America sat on the sidelines while other countries fought the Nazis, it wasn’t America’s problem. There were even those who thought the Nazis were a good thing. While America stood by, Germany was in the process of exterminating millions of Jews and others by gassing them.
Today Assad is doing the same thing except for the delivery system of the gas. The gas is being delivered by aircraft in a much more indiscriminate manner then the Nazis used. As opposed to a single group of people (the undesirables i.e. Jews, homosexuals, gypsies etc.) being murdered, Assad’s forces are gassing all the populace (men women and children) in areas held by rebels. They stopped for a while after Obama’s British Bobby style warning “Stop that or I shall be forced to tell you to stop that again!” But seeing there was no consequence Assad started again.
Kentucky you are right in saying that America “should NOT be sticking our whoozits in the fan over there.”
The only problem is that America has been sticking it’s whoozits into other countries business for a long, long time. This whole sordid affair in Syria is the result of America sticking it whoozits where it had no business to. The rebels wouldn’t be in this mess if Secretary of State Clinton, under the direction of Mr. Obama, hadn’t interfered. The rebels rose up on the promise of help from America which never came. So America walking away saying this ain’t my problem is bullshit. The reason this civil war started in the first place was because of American foreign policy actions.
Somewhat reminiscent of Charlie Wilson’s War. Stir it all up, then leave, then act surprised at what happens afterwards.
We never learn.