This is insane

This is insane. I have been following events in Washington for nearly 60 years. This is new, strange even by Trump's standards. The President is threatening a war with an adversary and the American people have no idea why. Congress is not helping. Supposedly, the Gang of Eight got an earful of the threat from Iran, and the full Congress will hear more next week.

The American people are being told nothing.

Politico reports, "Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are growing increasingly alarmed about developments in the Middle East.

"Sen. Mark Warner left a lengthy classified briefing on Iran Thursday afternoon with a provocative reaction: "It's very important that more members hear this story.'"

And the American people? Are we going to war without knowing why? What is our government hiding from us?

The briefings come amid fears of “credible” and "urgent" dangers to U.S. interests by Iran, Republican Senators said on Thursday. But Trump and the Republicans will not tell the people what those "credible and urgent dangers" are. This is really strange, even for Trump.

What makes this even more strange is that Iran has not attacked anyone and not started a war in two centuries.

Yet Trump wants us to believe that Iran will break that trend and attack the most powerful military force on the planet and is outgunned in every department, warships, warplanes, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and outnumbered in troop levels. Trump wants us to believe that the Persians are suicidal.

Not only that, due to the mercurial nature of the American President and his extreme naïveté, there is little doubt that Iran has ordered her proxies the U.S. forces are off-limits. Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthi have never attacked U.S. forces. The same could not be said of U.S. forces attacking them.

Shiite militias in Iraq have attacked U.S. forces, but that is a separate issue. The Shiites believe the American troops are occupiers. They get this silly notion because America invaded their country sixteen years ago and have stuck around since. Besides, that is old news. The Shiites have been attacking Americans since 2003. Also, they do so on their own authority, not that of the Iranian government.

Perhaps, this explains it.

JERUSALEM — Israel has been providing Washington with intelligence about potential Iranian attacks. Its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has made Iran’s strategic ambitions an obsession. And as recently as February he floated the idea of war with Iran.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/16/world/middleeast/israel-iran-netanyahu-war.html

 

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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/16/world/middleeast/iran-war-donald-trump.html

"May 16, 2019

WASHINGTON — President Trump has sought to put the brakes on a brewing confrontation with Iran in recent days, telling the acting defense secretary, Patrick Shanahan, that he does not want to go to war with Iran, administration officials said, while his senior diplomats began searching for ways to defuse the tensions."

So, yes, much of what you wrote is insane.

 

You are relying on what Trump says? Really? That is insane.

A little while ago Trump told reporters outside the White House that a New York Times story claiming his administration was reviewing military plans against Iran, possibly sending 120,000 troops, was "fake news."

But moments later, he reversed himself.

"Would I do that? Absolutely. But we have not planned for that," Trump said. "And if we did that, we'd send a hell of a lot more troops than that."

You know as well as I do that Trump is a pathological liar and he creates his own reality that has little in common with the truth. When he speaks or tweets, he is telling his base, Americans like you, exactly what they want to hear.

 

Sure, just like we were told Obama would be sending pallets of cash to Iran.

Maybe Kerry could get James Taylor to sing to them again.

 

You actually believe Iran hasn't been instrumental in covert attacks via funding of terrorists in two centuries.. Excuse me if I don't think you have been following Washington very closely for 60 years..

 

Putting aside the pro’s & cons of what Iran is or isn’t doing we have to face the fact a mentally unstable ( to say the least) president still has the power to press that red button. No matter if your ideology is left or right this should scare the living daylights out of all of you.

 

WOW now that was some down right FIRST CLASS fear mongering there! I believe MSNBC is looking for a few good people to add to their think tank, you would be PERFECT!

 

NO we are relying on what about a half dozen other people are saying Trump said. Your clear unsullied bias is showing again.

 

It is all a mistake.

Fox News reports, "A top Iranian general has told Iran-backed militias in Iraq to “prepare for proxy war” in the wake of heightened tensions between Iran and the U.S., which accused the militias of moving missiles toward American forces.

"Qassem Soleimani, a commander of Iran’s extraterritorial military operations Quds Force, called for a meeting with the militias three weeks ago, but the exact timing of the gathering remains unclear, the Guardian reported Thursday.

“It wasn’t a call to arms, but it wasn’t far off,” a senior intelligence [?] source told the newspaper."

Top Iranian generals have been issuing threats to American forces since our invasion of Iran's neighbor, Iraq, for sixteen years. It seems they don't like an American invasion force just across the border. What a bunch of troublemakers.

"The meeting likely played a role in the Trump administration’s decision this week to pull all non-essential government staff from Iraq." Well, SecState Pompeo is new at the job.

This is insane.

Turns out, according to the WSJ, this was all a big mistake.

Fox continued, "But intelligence collected by the U.S. government appears to also suggest that both Iran and the U.S. may have misread each other as being offensive rather than defensive, the Wall Street Journal reported.

"Iran apparently thought the U.S. was planning an attack on Iran, which prompted the regime to prepare for counterstrikes."

I told the government that last week. The "intelligence" no doubt came from the Trump White House with the good graces of guess who.

Fox adds, "At the same time, some within the Trump administration say that the same intelligence also suggests that Iran was planning to strike first. Such intelligence may have formed the basis of Pompeo’s claims during his meeting with the Iraqi top brass."

That is the most insane statement yet.

Hogwash! Trump has done this several times before. He creates crisis after crisis to distract from his myriad problems on the domestic front and the inability of his administration to govern. Trump thinks he is still a reality show host, and he thinks all of this is fun. If, in the process, it pisses off the liberals, all the better.

In the meantime he creates policy by Twitter and refuses to be questioned by the White House press corps. He has become the secret President, a coward afraid to face the American people. No wonder he needs serious distractions. The whole nation got sucked into this one because Trump is just crazy enough to start a war with Iran to distract from his troubles, and he is militarily challenged.

 

msnbc think tank??? now there's an oxymoron.

 

You left out an essential fact from your first sentence, no doubt on purpose.

It should read, "You actually believe Iran hasn't been instrumental in covert attacks on U.S. forces via funding of terrorists in two centuries."

Also, I said, "What makes this even more strange is that Iran has not attacked anyone and not started a war in two centuries."

That statement is true. Trump put us through this charade because he said Iran was threatening U.S. forces.

You also overlooked this para. "Not only that, due to the mercurial nature of the American President and his extreme naïveté, there is little doubt that Iran has ordered her proxies the U.S. forces are off-limits. Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthi have never attacked U.S. forces. The same could not be said of U.S. forces attacking them."

 

Will I didn't want to scare the applicant away is all

 

Sandy, the only crisis President Trump is creating is the one you hat has been living in your head since November 2016. You have to give him this, he has been 100% successful at keeping the alt-lefties in a total state of disarray.

 

100% ? It appears you haven’t encountered Pete Buttigieg’s substantial threat to Trump’s reign.

 

Are the same people that told the OP that we are going to war with Iran the people that told him Iran has been a peaceful nation for two hundred years?? Hahha

 

No I had it right, you're playing the leftist version where America is always the bad guy.. You just want to ignore the monetary side of their Mercenaries, their agents that sow discord in the region and so on. Iran is not innocent in any of the conflicts in the middle east, they certainly don't war but they pay a hefty sum to have it done for them..

 

Remember, Trump has his finger on the RED BUTTON!


He goes WE ALL GO! So how did I do

 

Then there are idiots like McCaul in Washington to fan the flames with Trump's base.

The top Republican lawmaker said Friday that the threat from Iran picked up by U.S. intelligence – which sparked a U.S. military deployment to the Middle East and heightened tensions across the region – was very specific and involved the possible kidnapping and killing of American soldiers. "Picked up by U.S. intelligence?" The commander no doubt broadcasted it to his entire Quds Force. It's what Quds Force commanders have been doing for sixteen years after our invasion of Iran's neighbor and ally, Iraq.

"To the extent I can discuss it, it was human intelligence," Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told USA TODAY on Friday. He was referring to intelligence information that prompted the Pentagon to deploy an aircraft carrier, along with B-52 bombers and other military forces, to the Middle East.

McCaul said U.S. intelligence officials learned that the head of Iran's Quds Force, a unit of Iran's military force, met with Iran's proxy militias and said: "We are getting ready to have a proxy war and target Americans."

Good Lord, the amount of stupidity on the part of Trump Republicans never ceases to amaze me.

 

Never trust a religious fanatic. We need to stay strong militarily and trust no one. Remember Pearl Harbor? Remember the Twin Towers?

 

Un Buti baby's not a substantial threat as of yet to crack the top five Democrats.

 

Good grief, Sandy!

Knock off the hysterics, will ya?

And don’t forget ... If your candidate had won in 2016, you would have elected the most militarily irresponsible candidate - a person who never saw a war she didn’t like - in modern history.

 

You have not been paying attention. I have said several times Trump is the bad guy, not America. This may come as a shock to you, but Trump is not America. As a mater of fact, if you had been following along, you would that America, including Senate Republicans, was very concerned about what Trump was doing.

I am so happy you brought up the monetary side of the question. Lets put this in perspective.

Keep in mind that Iran's proxy forces, Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthi, and Shiite militias all have their own leadership and their own agenda. Iran, of course, provides monetary and, in some cases, weaponry.

Israel receives over $3 billion in direct foreign assistance each year, which is roughly one-fifth of America's entire foreign aid budget. We also provide Israel some of the most sophisticated weaponry in the world, and our fighters and bombers stand ready to give Israel assistance if she is attacked. That is far more monetary assistance than Iran's proxies get a year. https://ifamericaknew.org/stat/usaid.html

Now here is my question. Is the U.S. responsible for everything the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) does?

You see it gets complicated when you take a look at the issues with unbiased eyes. It gets even more complicated when one realizes we invaded Iran's neighbor and, currently, over 5,000 American troops are stationed just over the border with Iran.

It gets even more complicated when one realizes that Trump removed the U.S. from the working Iranian nuclear agreement that permanently barred Iran from making a nuke. He replaced it with threats, sanctions, and warnings to our allies not to do business with Iran. It isn't working, thus the phony movement of ships, planes and Patriot missiles because Iran is threatening to do exactly what Trump did.

We invaded the Middle East. Remember? It's a people with glass houses thing.

Thank you for your input. I mean that.

 

Gee how courageous, he put the brakes on. Why were the brakes off in the first place? What did Iran do to merit such attention? Answer - nobody knows. What makes me real uncomfortable is that we have a young, Jewish moron who's only claim to Middle East expertise is that he is another moron's son-in-law running our Middle East policy. Then there's Bolton. Bolton isn't a hawk, Bolton is warmonger. Then there is Netanyahu, Bolton's brother in arms. Two morons and two warmongers, what could possibly go wrong?

If the Don doesn't want war with Iran, then fire Bolton, send is son-in-law on an assignment in Tibet and stop kissing Israel's collective ass. Either that or shut up, pony up another trillion dollars, sacrifice a few thousand young American's lives and kill countless Iranians too prove what a tough guy you are. BTW, how many of our allies are with us on this. Israel isn't an ally, Israel is a leach.

 

The New York Times are pathological liars.

 

Couldn't agree more regarding Bolton