Tornado Alley (PROG)

[conix]

The giant hole in Dems’ criticism of Trump’s attack on Qassem Soleimani: Goodwin



January 7, 2020


When it comes to Iran, the Democrats who want to be president are full of sound and fury. They are certain President Trump has brought us to the brink of war and demand answers about the imminent threat of attack the administration cited.

But if you ignore the noise and focus on their actual words, you notice a giant hole in the criticism. The leading Dems are not arguing that Trump was wrong to drone Qassem Soleimani, nor have they said flatly they would not have approved the mission.

Their sound and fury, then, amounts to empty screeching and nothing else.

Even Joe Biden, who gave a 20-minute speech in New York Tuesday, was blistering in his attacks on Trump, but stopped well short of faulting the targeting of Soleimani. The big demands of the former veep, who is running on his long experience with foreign policy, were that the president rejoin the Iranian nuclear deal — fat chance — and “explain what you’re doing.”

Similarly, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who had to be pushed in a TV interview to admit that Soleimani was a terrorist, said killing him was “incendiary” but did not claim she would have refused to do the same.

It was left to Michael Bloomberg to underscore the point his fellow candidates were slyly refusing to make. The former New York mayor said it was “outrageous” for Sen. Bernie Sanders to call the strike an “assassination,” then added
Jonathan Rose buys Queens property to create affordable middle-class housing

“This is a guy who had an awful amount of American blood on his hands. Nobody that I know of would think that we did something wrong in getting the general.”

Bravo for Bloomberg for daring to say the simple truth. His opponents should be ashamed of themselves.

In many ways, Trump’s decision on Soleimani and the timid reaction from the gaggle of Dem candidates highlights the difficulties of unseating a bold, activist president. Whatever you think of Trump, nobody ever said he’s an idle seat warmer.

Whether it’s confronting China and other nations over job-killing trade deals, cutting taxes and deregulations or just being vocal on several major topics nearly every day, the president doesn’t hide from the nation’s problems. You know where he stands, sometimes to a fault.

Indeed, a major reason why Speaker Nancy Pelosi jumped into the impeachment camp was that the relentless economic expansion and historic low unemployment rates gave Trump critics scarce safe spaces.

The Dems’ dilemma was best captured by the unforgettable words of Texas Rep. Al Green: “I’m concerned that if we don’t impeach this president, he will get re-elected.”

So far, the Soleimani episode incorporates those complications and adds others for the candidates seeking the nomination. To start with, none of the top-tier Dems is popular enough that he or she can adopt a peace-at-any-price approach in a post 9/11 world.

While some of the radical backbenchers fall into that camp, including Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, there is no significant constituency for unilateral disarmament. Sidelined kneeler Colin Kaepernick made the peacenik position permanently toxic by declaring that “there is nothing new about American terrorist attacks against black and brown people for the expansion of American imperialism.”

Moreover, it’s not as if recent presidents ­haven’t tested the limits of shrinking America’s military footprint. Barack Obama tried to disengage from Iraq and got the creation of ISIS as a result. Trump wants desperately to bring our troops home from Syria, but the slaughter of our Kurdish allies by Turkey intervened.

The Biden speech illuminated the limits the candidates face. His team sensed the moment provided an opening for him to exploit and prepared an address to underscore his experience and separate him from the pack.

Nice try, but no sale. For one thing, the impromptu circumstances left something to be desired. There was no audience, save the predictable American-flag backdrop, and Biden read his remarks from teleprompters in a flat monotone.

Politico reports that he first had a fundraiser at the Skadden Arps law firm, where he twice confused Iraq with Iran. He made the same mistake in the speech.

The flubs recall concerns about his mental state. And it’s impossible to forget former Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ observation that Biden has been wrong about nearly every major foreign-policy issue for four decades.

As for the content of the speech, the kindest thing that can be said was that it was unimpressive. Biden’s attacks on Trump were predictable, as was his praise of Obama’s Iranian nuke deal.

Yet few people outside Obama dead-enders believe the deal’s terms were adequate, and there is little doubt that the money Obama gave Iran and his lifting of sanctions fueled Soleimani’s expanded terrorist aggression.

Most oddly, Biden faulted Trump for not responding when Iran shot down one of our drones last June, saying it fed “Iran’s sense of impunity.” In truth, Iran’s sense of impunity was something Trump inherited from the Obama-Biden administration, and taking down Soleimani made the point that the game was over.

That, of course, is the ultimate distinction between Trump and the top Dems. While none dares say he was wrong, it’s fairly obvious that, if any of them were in the Oval Office, Soleimani still would be alive.

Chalk that up as something else they are afraid to admit.

https://nypost.com/2020/01/07/the-giant-hole-in-dems-criticism-of-trumps-attack-on-qassem-soleimani-goodwin/