Little Friday Comment
POST 1187
As of this writing President Trump has said that he will make up his TACO mind about whether to go to war against Iran within the next two weeks.* Why he would make such a strategic announcement to our adversaries like a circus barker saying “You ain’t seen nuthin yet?” This comes from somewhere beyond sanity or national security.
This is not a commentary about what Trump’s decision should be. Rather, it’s about his decision making methodology and the limitations of this president of greatly limited capability.
Our news folk are telling us that he is conferring with:
The civilian leader of our national defense. I find no comfort in hearing that he is giving serious consideration to what SecDef Pete Hegseth has to say. He’s the guy who had to overtly declare that he’d stop his drunken ways if he were confirmed for the post he now holds and we don’t know if he’s honored his pledge. He’s the same fool responsible for failing to protect what should have been top secret plans to bomb the Houthis in order to protect our shipping through the Gulf of Hormuz. He instead sent his plans over an unsecured service with at least one participant on the string having no security clearance at all. Are we supposed to trust his advice to the President regarding our military services and security in war?
Our military defense people. Trump dumped all the top people – the generals – who he knew were primarily loyal to the Constitution. He replaced them with people primarily loyal to Trump. Who cares about some pesky solemn oath, anyway?
Can we be confident these replacements will refuse to obey an illegal order?
Our intelligence people. Lots of agencies there, but they all funnel to the Director of National Intelligence, who right now is Tulsi Gabbard. That’s “Putin Talker” Gabbard. That’s “no experience in intelligence work” Gabbard or even at keeping a secret. Not hard to imagine that she might give advice to the President based upon what Vladimir Putin wants us to do, rather than what is in the best interests of our country. Worse, it’s not hard to imagine Trump preferring to hear about Putin’s preferences.
Our Secretary of State. Marco Rubio is a smooth talking, pleasant looking pol who has shown us repeatedly that he is not much more than a political weather vane. He will say and do only what Trump wants him to say and do, leaving decisions and policy without a check or expanded options.
Then there is Trump’s learning disability and gnat-like attention span. This president doesn’t read. They’ve had to put the President’s Daily Brief (“PDB”) into comic book format. They’ve tried creating videos for this reality show freak of a man to advise him of international threats.
He can’t stay with any train of thought for more than a few minutes. That isn’t sufficient when the topic is anything more complex than how many Big Macs this infant tyrant wants for dinner, much less for the brutal and perilous questions of war.
Fortunately, the power to declare war rests solely with the Congress, not the president. Unfortunately, we have no assurance that the Congress will put on its big boy and big girl pants and stop this president from acting from his dementia addled brain to get a lot of people killed with no thought to the day after.
Our last two forays into war lasted 20 years, got over 7,000 American troops killed, hundreds of thousands of locals killed, millions displaced and upheaval in the region that continues even today. All that was started by a similarly un-serious, incompetent president who listened to the wrong people and whose primary concerns were his popularity and his legacy. He lied us into wars against two nations that had done us no harm and were not a threat to us.
Trump craves grossly narcissistic things, including money, power and adulation. He gets none of those from Benjamin Netanyahu, leaving the possibility of a chip on Trump’s shoulder that may influence his decision about war against Iran. But it shouldn’t.
Now, in this appallingly dangerous world, un-serious incompetence is more lethal than ever and we are once again saddled with it.
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* That “two weeks” business is nothing but a stall to make Trump seem in control, seem assertive and to give him time to do a dozen other outrageous things to distract you so that you stop thinking about whatever he was supposed to make happen in two weeks. Think: Infrastructure Week.
Stop listening to talking heads who grind on about what will happen in two weeks. That grind isn’t worth your time or attention.
Countdown to November 3, 2026
Mid-Term Election
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