Just days after the world learned once again that Bush ignored warnings that Americans would be killed on home soil, conservatives have decided that the attacks that took place across the ocean mean President Obama needs to resign.
Michael Goodwin, writing in that bastion of right wing spit the New York Post, managed to fill a rather short article with almost nothing but right-wing conspiracies that have long been debunked. But here’s a new one, “In an accident of timing that captures his cluelessness, the president actually declared on Friday morning that Islamic State had been “contained,” practically boasting in a TV interview that, ‘They have not gained ground in Iraq and in Syria.'”
Here is what Obama said in the exclusive ABC interview, by the way he said this “on the same day U.S. forces conducted an airstrike in Raqqa, Syria, targeting Mohamed Emwazi, the British citizen and ISIS terrorist known as ‘Jihadi John.'”
The clip opens with Stephanopoulos saying (my bold) the President said how “difficult it would be to eliminate the threat from that deadly terror group.”
Stephanopoulos then presented the criticism that “what President Obama has on the ground is not enough” (referring to Syria and Iraq, presumably).
“I don’t think they’re gaining strength. From the start our goal has been first to contain, and we have contained them. They have not gained ground in Iraq. And in Syria it — they’ll come in, they’ll leave,” Obama said in rebuttal to the criticism that he needs more on the ground in Syria. “But you don’t see this systematic march by ISIL across the terrain.”
But here President Obama says how difficult it’s going to be to take them out, and that we have not done this yet (my bold), “What we have not yet been able to do is to completely decapitate their command and control structures.”
“We’ve made some progress in trying to reduce the flow of foreign fighters,” Obama said. “Part of our goal has to be to recruit more effective Sunni partners in Iraq to really go on offense rather than simply engage in defense.”
The real fool in this scenario is Republican presidential front-runner Ben Carson, who said it would be easy to take ISIL out by bombing their oil fields. Stephanopoulos asked Obama about Carson’s suggestion, and Obama said, “What I think is he doesn’t know much about it.”
So what you have there is a discussion about ISIL in Syria and Iraq, with an unfortunate sound bite, but not completely accurate. The President wasn’t doing a “Mission Accomplished” victory tour. He very clearly said it would be difficult to eliminate the ISIL threat, and we have not been able to completely decapitate their command and control structures.
The President was saying they were contained in Syria and experts agree. They are not just contained, but losing, which is why they are expanding:
“This attack is the first of the storm,” the ISIS statement threatened, and if the recent bombing targeting Hezbollah in Beirut, and the crash of the Russian airline in Sinai prove to be the work of ISIS as well, then the organization—under pressure on the ground in Iraq and Syria—would appear to be waging a concerted campaign to take the fight to its enemies.
…
Alain Bauer, a leading French criminologist and adviser to officials in Paris, New York, and elsewhere about counter-terror strategies, is among those who believes that ISIS is lashing out precisely because it is under pressure on the ground. But a war of attrition fought like the Battle of Paris this week has to be addressed at the source.
So because Obama said they were more contained in Syria (which experts agree with, but some experts say we need to “erase” Raqqa, collateral damage be damned because that’s how they hide, and we can’t be asking for permission first, which is yet another problem because obviously Republicans would threaten to impeach Obama again), he needs to resign, according to the New York Post‘s Michael Goodwin, in a story that has been trending all day:
Paris is the final straw. Obama’s exemption from reality has expired. He must either commit to leading the free world to victory, or step aside so someone else can.
There is no more time to avoid the truth of war. America must organize the combined forces of the civilized world before Islamic State makes good on its vow to “taste” more American blood.
If the horrific attacks in Paris were the “final straw” for Obama, former President George W Bush would have had to resign after “Mission Accomplished.” Or any number of seemingly endless gaffes. Or how about the entire lie that led us to invade Iraq in the first place.
No, no, patriots, that was a time for you to get in line behind your CIC. After all, we were at war! How dare you criticize the CIC during a time of war. Where is your flag and why aren’t you wearing a pin that identifies that you super love the USA?
Cut to: Obama, who got Osama when Bush couldn’t be bothered, is to resign because terrorists exist, a fact we assisted greatly when we invaded Iraq and left a power vacuum in our wake.
Chris Whipple revealed the horror in Politico (my bold):
Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” The CIA’s famous Presidential Daily Brief, presented to George W. Bush on August 6, 2001, has always been Exhibit A in the case that his administration shrugged off warnings of an Al Qaeda attack. But months earlier, starting in the spring of 2001, the CIA repeatedly and urgently began to warn the White House that an attack was coming.
By May of 2001, says Cofer Black, then chief of the CIA’s counterterrorism center, “it was very evident that we were going to be struck, we were gonna be struck hard and lots of Americans were going to die.”
….
But neither he nor Black has spoken about it publicly in such detail until now—or been so emphatic about how specific and pressing their warnings really were.
I’m not sure how else to say this after seven years of Republican hypocrisy, so I’ll be brief. LOOK IN THE MIRROR. Not one single Republican presidential candidate has even a tenuous grasp on the issues here, and if they think the increased focus on national security bodes well for Jeb Bush, they should put down the crack.
Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Connect with Sarah on Post, Mastodon @PoliticusSarah@Journa.Host, & Twitter.
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