Posted on 11/17/2015 6:42:48 AM PST by Kaslin
"Why can't we take out these bastards?" CNN's Jim Acosta bluntly asked President Obama at a Monday press conference at the Group of 20 summit in Turkey. "These bastards," of course, are the Islamic State -- at least for Acosta. As Obama called Friday's attacks in Paris that left at least 129 dead a "sickening setback," he saw no need to reset his Syrian policy.
Obama has been in a state of denial about the Islamic State. In 2014, the president famously told The New Yorker that the Islamic State, also known as ISIS and in Arabic, Daesh, was a "JV team" that might dress like the Lakers but would never match Kobe Bryant. The day before the Paris attacks, Obama told ABC the Islamic State was "contained" in Iraq and Syria.
His cardinal sin, however, is not a poor choice of words, but his failure to cut a deal with Iraq to leave U.S. troops behind after 2011. By not leaving behind a force that could douse hot spots as needed, the administration created a safe zone for al-Qaida and its offshoots. That void enabled the Islamic State to seize Iraqi cities.
It's no wonder Obama wants the United States to take in some Syrian refugees -- he helped create them.
At Saturday night's CBS Democratic debate, moderator John Dickerson asked Hillary Rodham Clinton if as secretary of state, she shared Obama's legacy of underestimating ISIS. Clinton deftly tossed the blame for the decision to withdraw all U.S. troops from Iraq onto President George W. Bush. "We abided by the agreement" Bush signed with Iraq in 2008, she said, to withdraw all U.S. troops by Dec. 31, 2011. As the Washington Post Fact Checker noted, there was some expectation, however, that Baghdad ultimately would agree to terms that would have allowed some U.S. troops to stay -- but the Obama administration did not offer terms conducive to a deal.
Obama told reporters that it is easy for GOP presidential candidates to use "bellicose" language -- they don't have to go to Walter Reed Army hospital, as he has done, and look in the eye U.S. troops severely wounded in battles he ordered. Therefore, Obama concluded, "I can't afford to play some of the political games that others make."
I respect that sentiment. I also understand that whatever course a president takes, there will be victims who have to pay the price. There is no risk-free path.
The problem with Obama is that he will send troops into harm's way -- just enough troops to quiet his critics, but not necessarily enough make sure their sacrifices pay off. He ordered a surge of troops in Afghanistan, which was needed, but undercut their ability to prevail and emboldened the enemy when he simultaneously announced he would begin to withdraw them in 2011.
Many Democrats never will fully trust Clinton because she voted to go to war in Iraq. Saturday night she again called the U.S. invasion of Iraq a "mistake" -- and that's supposed to square her with primary voters. As one who supported that war, I cannot trust Clinton because she voted to go to war, then abandoned the mission when it hurt her chances of winning the White House. Clinton obviously has determined that resolve is optional.
Obama is a sickening setback for our country. Paris has exposed his true loyalties.
0bama doesn’t WANT to take out ISIS.
“What the hell is wrong with you, Mr. President?”
That’s the correct question.
Of course we can take out ISIS if 0bama WANTED to. So, obviously, he likes keeping ISIS.
WHAT THE F*** IS WRONG WITH YOU MR. PRESIDENT?
The Won is inflicting ISIS upon the USA as a punishment for our arrogance, racism & colonialism.
Obama is a Sickening Setback for the United States.
F U B O!
YOU can't afford??? This is not about YOU, you asshole. What a jerk.
Secondly, could you at least utter one sentence that is grammatically correct? What a putz.
Answer: Because Obama is one of those bastards.
A setback?! What an insult to the people of France. This and his claim that ISIS was contained is pathetic. He’s a liar - and no one in Congress has the guts to call him on it.
This might be not be approved by the moderator, but what the heck:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMVmhI1SUq0
Maybe Mr. Knight could impart his wisdom as demonstrated in the above link in the Oval Office sometime (soon).
The failure to deal with ISIS IS the strategy!
A sickening setback for Obama?! Even moreso for the almost two hundred people murdered1
He has made that abundantly clear!
After listening to his press conference yesterday, he doesn't even want to be questioned about ISIS.
Actually she has a point. Hoping that the next administration would make a better deal doesn't absolve Bush from making a bad deal in the first place. Bush punted hoping someone else would fix it, just like he did with Iran's nukes. He knew Obama was running on the promise to end the war. There was no reason to expect Obama would get better terms than Bush did.
It is time for either impeachment and removal, or the use of the 25th Amendment, Section 4.
This man is unwilling to fulfill his oath of office. and is actually acting contrary to it.
He cannot remain in the Oval Office.
I watched Obamas press conference at the G20.
It was painful...and embarrassing.
In the face of the obvious, he is doubling down on his misbegotten and failed plans and strategies.
Within the last week, members of his own administration testified before Congress that the US could not vet these Syrian refugees...and for obvious reasons. There are no records.
Unless one comes to us whom we have already gotten good info/intel on...we do not know who any of them are.
The FBI, Homeland Security, intelligence, and others have all said the same thing.
But yesterday, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, the President and his press secretary...and now his other sycophants are saying we have a very “robust†method in place to vet them.
Sure we do...like France did.
France knew who the people in Belgium ere, but they had no idea about the two refugees who had crossed through Greece just 3-4 weeks before. Neither would we.
Now, the American people are demanding a cessation to this madness...and many of our governors are listening and standing up to it and demanding the same.
Obama hates America, its founding, its underlying principles, and its place in the world. He has done all in his power to fundamentally change that...and will continue to do so.
It is what defines him and it is who he is.
Who is Barrack Hussein Obama?
http://www.freewebs.com/jeffhead/whoisobama.htm
The Iran nuke deal did that already.
Well, that’s the end of his career at CNN. You don’t ask the “anointed one” that type of question. /sarc
a setback for obama, eh? poor chap. wasn’t much good for the 130 or so dead people either...
By “sickening setback,” he means this slows down the advance of Islam in North America and the establishment of a caliphate here. He wants the black flag over the white hut.
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