General Mattis For President?
As you probably know, General Mattis just resigned as Secretary of Defense. I don't know a lot about him, but it popped in to my head that he might make a good presidential candidate on the Democratic Party ticket. Let's explore that together.
As a place to start, here's his Wikipedia page.
What I think I know so far is that he is a highly respected general who has been a life long Democrat.
Here's my reasoning so far.
In order to win the next election the Dems will probably have to peel off some of those who voted for Trump. Liberal candidates like Elizabeth Warren would seem to have no chance of doing that. General Mattis might be the kind of candidate who could.
General Mattis has a reputation of being highly competent, surely something we're all ready for. And he's no shrinking violent when it comes to national security policy, so nobody will be able to paint the Dems as being weak on defense.
For now, first impression, he seems like the kind of candidate who might be able to unite the country, at least to some degree.
What say you? Should we launch the Mattis For President campaign right here on this forum?
As a place to start, here's his Wikipedia page.
What I think I know so far is that he is a highly respected general who has been a life long Democrat.
Here's my reasoning so far.
In order to win the next election the Dems will probably have to peel off some of those who voted for Trump. Liberal candidates like Elizabeth Warren would seem to have no chance of doing that. General Mattis might be the kind of candidate who could.
General Mattis has a reputation of being highly competent, surely something we're all ready for. And he's no shrinking violent when it comes to national security policy, so nobody will be able to paint the Dems as being weak on defense.
For now, first impression, he seems like the kind of candidate who might be able to unite the country, at least to some degree.
What say you? Should we launch the Mattis For President campaign right here on this forum?
Comments (60)
I'm not so sure about that. One must distinguish two different albeit overlapping populations: those who make up Trump's hardcore base, and those who merely voted for him. Many people who voted for Trump are liberals or centrists, and some even progressives, and they voted for him because they were dissatisfied with establishment politicians and/or neo-liberals and hence couldn't vote for Hillary. Many among them might have voted for Bernie (if he had won the primary) since he also was an anti-establishment candidate and he didn't exhibit Trump's numerous personal flaws. So, many of those people who voted for Trump, but don't necessarily belong to his unmovable hardcore base, might vote for a progressive candidate like Warren.
Imho, far too few of such folks to matter. I just can't picture the person who voted for Trump now voting for Warren.
My guess is that all Dems are going to vote against Trump no matter who the Democratic candidate is, though perhaps turnout would be affected by who the particular candidate is.
Another factor, how could Trump demonize Mattis when Trump praised him and selected him for very high office, and never fired him? If Mattis were the candidate, how does Trump do his thing?
I would agree that Mattis would likely alienate some progressives, but where are they going to go? Are they really going to stay home and thus essentially vote for Trump? My guess is that such folks whine and complain, but in the end would pull the lever for Mattis, their hatred of Trump being so extreme.
Another guess is that the Trump henchmen are already digging through Mattis's history looking for some kind of dirt they can sling. If there's any thing there, that could kill this theory. And of course Mattis may have no interest in the job.
Before the primaries were over there frequently were heads up polls between possible nominee matchups. Trump against Hillary were usually evenly matched but Bernie against Trump typically showed Bernie having a 10% lead over Trump. You may be underestimating how much the electorate was fed up with the establishment, and not only the Republican electorate: The Bernie or Bust movement was quite intense too.
I updated my quickie comment to add a bit more intelligent analysis above.
Yes, I am a Bernie fan, and agree with what you just said above. I agree that the disenchantment with the establishment was strong, but how does a Bernie voter become a Trump voter?? I voted for Bernie in the primary myself, but in the end had to hold my nose and vote for Hillary because the only other choice was simply too awful. But, maybe my own experience is over coloring my view of this, that could be possible.
On the other hand, it seems Dems are typically having to prove that they can be tough where needed. Obama succeeded in making this case imho, while still being measured and careful and not jumping in to every fight. Can Mattis sell himself as being tough where needed, but not someone who will launch unnecessary wars? I don't know, need more information.
What happened isn't mainly that potential Bernie voters voted for Trump but rather that, after Hillary won the primaries, they didn't bother to vote at all. So, if Warren would win the next primaries, many of those former Bernie or Bust folks who didn't vote at all might vote for her. Also, many anti-establishment right leaning folks who abhor Trump might decline to vote at all if Trump, or another pseudo-anti-establishment Trumpoid, would face Warren in 2020. The combination of those two factors, it seems to me, precisely is what accounted for the 10% advantage of Bernie had over Trump (in the heads up polls) as compared with the even match between Hillary and Trump. It's important not to overlook who it is that doesn't vote when comparing matchup scenarios.
I wonder how happy they are with that decision now? But, I hear what you're saying and don't really disagree.
If the Dems were to run a progressive candidate, they will have to find one much better than Bernie or Warren in my view. There's more to winning than just having appropriate policy positions. Both Bernie and Warren are afflicted with the kind of personalities that have alienated people from the left for far too long. All angry all the time with large doses of snotty superiority just doesn't cut it.
There may a winning progressive out there somewhere who I haven't thought of. But until I see one I think can win, people like Mattis retain their appeal. To me, getting Trump out of office is the priority, and I want the candidate with the best chance of accomplishing that all important mission.
I guess I'm just expressing my fear that the Dems will self destruct by nominating another one of their thoroughly mediocre candidates. So for listening to NPR all day every day has not revealed a candidate that seems to have a solid shot at beating Trump.
In my view, the best candidate for the country is anybody but Trump. I hear what you're saying, generally wise advice, but this is an extreme situation. If Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse is the Democratic ticket, that's who I'll be voting for.
I'd just as soon generals stayed on base. Civilians are supposed to be in charge of the government.
The problem isn't whether Bernie Sanders (who will be 80 years old in 2021) or Elizabeth Warren would be better than Donald Trump. We currently have a junk yard dog in office, so the list of candidates who would be better than Trump is exceeding long. The problem is the practice of politics has entered a new stage.
The problem is an unrecognized, unstated, unspoken class war.
The Republican Party's policies--instantiated in the federal office of the president and in a number of state governments--is un-democratic and is carrying out class warfare against working class people. [Here's a relevant slogan to tattoo on your body where you can see it: Class war is the only war.] The Democratic Party is not all sweetness and light, of course. They would be, should be, and are opposed to the Republican's crude methods, but they look good only because the Republicans look so bad. Neither party is in favor of any significant redistribution of wealth, and with it, a redistribution of power, away from the oligarchy and favoring the working class (who are about 90% of the population).
But the real problem is, again, class warfare. It isn't a new thing in this country. The Gilded Age, located in the later third of the 19th Century was a period of class war. The Progressive Era was a counter reaction, followed by an intense and vicious Red Scare attack on the working class brought on by the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia. The 1930s produced another braking of the class war in the form of several New Deal programs which conservatives in the Republican Party would very much like to destroy (80+ years later) along with Medicare and several other minor reforms like the ACA (aka ObamaCare).
White working class people enjoyed a boom, and a fairly generous economy after WWII. The tide began to turn against the working class in the 1960s, and picked up speed in subsequent decades. The economic slide of working people was subtle, but steady, in the form of a slow, continuing fall in wages and purchasing power from the mid-1970s forward, along with a steady accumulation of the percentage of wealth among the oligarchy (both of which were helped along by tax law). Whether the Democrats or Republicans were in power between 1968 and the present has mattered little.
So, what we have right now is a more savage Republican attack on both democracy (which is most useful to the working classes -- the oligarchy can get along quite well without it) and state services. Look at Wisconsin: The Wisconsin Republican Party managed to bust public employee unions, retrench state services, and then to frost the cake, passed several laws on their way out which will hamper the next governor (a Democrat) in governing.
Before you vote for the poultry and vermin characters, better check out Walt Disney's politics. Bugs Bunny (Warner Brothers) has a deep irreverent streak which commends him more than the duck and rat.
He's going to be missed.
There is some precedent for ex-generals becoming President, and pretty good ones at that. I can in fact think of 3 off the top of my head (viz. Washington, Grant, and Eisenhower). Presumably, one must resign one's military commission (or already be out of the service) before becoming President, so they are technically civilians when elected.
I would still just as soon the generals stay on base, but I'll grant you that generals are not inherently unfit for Hail to the Chief. Government (and its personnel) ought to be honest and competent. Good and bad presidents prove that it is the character and ability of the individual in the office that counts. Our system don't need more Hardings, Nixons, Reagans, Bushes and Trumps. What the US needs are more of are Lincolns, Roosevelts (both), and Kennedys.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Someone with good character would be nice. :up:
Why? I don't.
You see Mattis is your basic general who basically represents the normal US geopolitic strategy. And these strategists typically want to avoid escalations and put a lot of emphasis on the status quo, just like other countries normally do.
It is the politicians with an agenda who crave for escalation and change, it the people like the neocons that after seeing that the US could form a formidable alliance during the Gulf War, could get a green light from the UN and even from Soviet Union and have a short war to liberate Kuwait, they then take it as free pass that the US can do absolutely anything totally indenpendently of others.
Generals are typically risk avoiders and do understand the role of the military just to be a deterrence: that actually your whole foreign and security policy is a success when you don't have to deploy your troops in a war. The exception to this rule is general Flynn, who totally went into the political bullshitting of the Trump campaign. Needless to say few if any other general has been fired from his positions so many times. Yet usually it's not the generals, it's the politicians who want to show that they are tough guys and get the US into some foreign quagmire.
And I believe Mattis has no intention to get into politics. I will just wait that he will write his memoirs after the Trump debacle and give an insight to this most chaotic and deplorable administration lead by the worst President in US history (at least until now).
Did you read the Wikipedia page? Look at his political views regarding Iran and Middle Eastern allies, Japan, Russia, and China.
And what on Earth is wrong with those views? First of all, He's the secretary of defence of the Trump administration. It's his job to talk about possible security threats.
Ok, let's really go through what that page says about Mattis:
Iran:
Mattis believes Iran is the principal threat to the stability of the Middle East, ahead of Al-Qaeda and ISIS.
Middle Eastern allies:
Mattis praises the friendship of regional US allies such as Jordan, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates.
Japan:
Mattis emphasized that the United States remains committed to the mutual defense of Japan
Russia:
Mattis said he believed that Russian President Vladimir Putin's intent is "to break NATO apart." Mattis has also spoken out against what he perceives as Russia's expansionist or bellicose policies in Syria, Ukraine and the Baltic states
China:
Mattis called for freedom of navigation in the South China Sea and criticized China's island-building activities, saying: "The bottom line is [...] the international waters are international waters."
And we should also add here his view about the Palestinian question:
Mattis supports a two-state solution model for Israeli–Palestinian peace. He has said the situation in Israel is "unsustainable" and that Israeli settlements harm prospects for peace and could lead to an apartheid-like situation in the West Bank.
S, what above do you find so incredible here? That above is basically your foreign policy consensus. And goes in many cases against especially Trump (on Russia and the Palestinian question).
They risk escalating tensions, as I said. You seem to be in denial here. The article made clear his hard line approach to those countries that I mentioned. I would be concerned about someone like Mattis jumping on a situation in the Middle East, especially to get at Iran, or in the South China Sea regarding disputed islands, or with Russia. Fighting fire with fire, bare knuckle diplomacy vs. bare knuckle diplomacy. That's a risky game to play.
I never mentioned the Palestinian question, with good reason, because I think that that's an exception. So that's a red herring.
Right, that's the thing, what are their chances? Having a particular philosophy doesn't matter if one doesn't get elected, such as the last Bernie type.
But with the last Bernie-type - that being the man himself - the biggest obstacle to not getting elected was the Democratic party itself, which chose the wrong candidate.
I hope they'll find someone like Bernie who has a good enough chance, and only if that fails would I consider supporting someone like Mattis so as to prevent someone worse from the other side. So, for me, Mattis would be the new Hillary. Potentially more popular and with a better chance of winning, but he would have to match or beat the kind of stuff that Hillary was saying, especially on things such as taxation, or else in my opinion he would be a worse candidate in that sense. I'm guessing that Mattis leans further to the right than Hillary, which would count against him for someone like me.
There is nothing escalatory or basically different as those views do not differ from past administrations. It's you that is in denial here or simply ignorant about US foreign policy, of both Democratic and Republican administrations. Just look at the following quote:
That was a direct quote from President Obama. I don't see a huge difference on the stance and what Mattis has said. Above all, if you would have a Clinton administration rather than a Trump one, the line that Mattis takes would extremely likely be the foreign policy stance too.
Quoting S
Except that he, just like the military leaders in your country, think that attacking Iran is a really bad move. And "jumping" on the other two countries is the last thing the US military wants to do. First of all, is it so difficult to understand deterrence? That you have a firm stance and that decreases the chance of escalation? And having a firm stance doesn't mean you want war. Si vis pacem, para bellum
And I don't understand why calling the situation with Russia how it is, is escalatory. Because Russia's objective is to break apart NATO and make Atlanticism a thing of the past. It's a bit confusing why Americans don't see the hostility towards them in this. Perhaps it's because of this ignorant self centered attitude that because you don't have anything against Russia, then Putin doesn't have anything against you. Hence the best way forward then is to appease Putin and give him what he wants as a "gesture of friendship" and not to "escalate" things. One can be self critical about the actions of your own country, but that self criticism can get carried too far away, when one starts to think that every problem happens because of US actions.
Right, but you're going to vote Dem no matter what, right? Me too. So we don't count.
If I could vote, then yes, that would probably be what I'd do.
Quoting Jake
I'm not fully onboard with your analysis. The tactic of trying to find a middle-of-the-road candidate to capture swing votes might work. Or it might not. A better tactic might be to embrace a more radical position and capture momentum, like Bernie did and like Trump did - and the latter was successful. Hillary was more moderate than Bernie, and Hillary failed. There is evidence to suggest that Bernie would've done better than Hillary and would've perhaps even beat Trump to win the presidency. So maybe they were on to something.
I think that unorthodox is popular right now. Not just in the US, but look at France, Germany, and the UK, where unorthodoxy has gained political prominence.
Good point. Bernie was remarkably successful too, for a guy who calls himself a socialist. Yes, if we could identify non-voting Dems and get them off the bench, that might work.
On the other hand, ideally we want a President who most people feel represents the country as a whole, and not just the nutzo wing of one of the political parties. You know, after the election there is governing, which can be hard to do if the election totally polarizes the country.
Polarizing the electorate seems to be the new fad. And I think that the American voters aren't yet so tired of the partisanship and of loathing the other party that they really would want a President who seeks consensus.
He resigned because the President wanted to withdraw a token 2,000 American troops from Syria. Too few to have any real military effectiveness and served only as a trip-wire force warning potential aggressors that an assault on the Syrian Kurds would likely kill Americans and trigger a larger war with the US. But... does the US really want to go to war against Turkey or Assad? While we could probably win such a war, would it serve any American purpose?
The President believes that it isn't America's task to straighten out Syria and make it right. (It's Syria's job.) Nor it is America's job to turn the Syrian Kurds into an American protectorate for whom we become eternally responsible. We were in Syria to help defeat ISIS, and now that ISIS no longer holds any territory and its "caliphate" has been erased from the map, that's been successfully accomplished. It probably remains as an Islamist insurgency, but the locals need to be the ones to tackle that. We don't need to become another participant in Syria's all-against-all civil war.
The United States probably needs to recognize that the current chaos in Syria is in some part America's doing, if not created then certainly exacerbated by the Obama administration's childishly idealistic support for the "Syrian rebels". All we accomplished with that one was speeding Syria's devolution into another of the Middle East's failed states. So unless we are willing to impose a solution on them, which didn't work so well in Iraq and would require hundreds of thousands of troops and countless casualties if it succeeded at all, we probably shouldn't be there.
So do the democrats really want to become the party of never-ending war in the Middle East, the successor to George W. Bush's "neoconservatives"? I'm not sure that the American voters would favor that. Especially from a democratic administration that's perceived by much of the electorate as wanting to defend Syria's borders but not America's own.
Good point. It seems an issue of timing. Sooner or later the polarization fad pendulum will swing in the other direction. When exactly that will happen, whether 2020 is the moment for that, I would agree is unknown.
If you are right, then the only path forward would seem to be to get more Dems to the polls. And so perhaps we should recall, Hillary got more votes than Bernie.
Do you want Trump to have another 6 years in office, yes or no?
If you answer yes, peace be with you, and conversation over.
If you answer no then the question is, who can beat Trump in the next election? It simply doesn't matter what some hypothetical Democratic candidate believes if they can't beat Trump.
I'm not arguing that Mattis is the only Dem who can beat Trump, or even that he is the best choice. I'm saying only that he seems a more interesting prospect than anyone I've seen mentioned as a possible Dem candidate so far.
It's entirely reasonable to point to objections anyone might have with Mattis, but if it's not Mattis, then who do the critics of Mattis have in mind? If no one specific, then you should be able to understand my concern. Who exactly is it that we Dems will put in charge of defeating Trump? As the last election should have demonstrated, it had better be somebody good.
Quoting Jake
A democrat, or at the very least someone who represents democratic aspirations and shares democratic values.
DO YOU WANT TO BEAT TRUMP, OR NOT, YES OR NO???
If yes, who do you propose that would have a better chance of beating Trump than Mattis? I'm entirely open to that conversation. I will admit to growing weary of the usual forum routine of "whatever somebody else says is wrong, but we have no solutions of our own to offer". That's lazy, raise your game my good fellows!
Yeah, why trust a guy who gives you several verifiable facts you can check out for yourself when you can yell at him in all-caps instead.
Quoting Jake
If you're interested in an open conversation then I would suggest you consider following-up on facts which as they are presented and respond to reasonable comments without turning on the caps-lock.
Quoting Jake I will admit to growing weary of the usual forum routine where I reasonably correct people on basic facts pertinent to the thread and they react unreasonably.
We did that already. We lost. So....
Who specifically? Which Democrat? Again, it doesn't matter if a candidate "represents democratic aspirations and shares democratic values" unless they can win. Who can win?
It's your claim, you do the homework and present it to us. Until then I'm sticking with NPR.
I apologize for the cap locks, but you are blatantly ignoring the question of this thread..
WHO CAN WIN??
My reason for not getting into the specific names that every reasonable observer is familiar with -- Sherrod Brown, Kamala Harris, Adam Schiff, etc. -- is that if you're reacting with such contempt to my presenting you with facts that you can verify for yourself, yet refuse to do so, I can only imagine how you'll react to a speculative discussion about potential candidates and their merits. You have obviously concluded for some strange reason that Mattis is the only plausible candidate. Strange, again, because he's not a democrat and you refuse to verify this fact because of something you heard one time on NPR.
Not any point I made. I'm making an argument for out of the box candidates, with Mattis being only an example. I clearly said in my opening post I don't know that much about him.
Quoting John Doe
There are many candidates with solid Democrat credentials. Hillary Clinton had that out the wazoo. She lost.
Quoting John Doe
Trump clobbered every professional politician he encountered. All of them. Every one of them. In both parties. He didn't just beat Clinton, he beat everybody, including the media that was confidently predicting his demise up until the very end. I think you under estimate how dangerous complacency is.
Quoting John Doe
I've already explained that above. You've articulated no success strategy other than more of the same which has already failed. I accept that you are a sincere Democrat, I don't accept that you are serious about winning. And I'm saying this not so much to you personally as I am the entire Democratic Party.
Quoting John Doe
This is a philosophy forum. Each person making a claim bears the burden for supporting their own claim. Again, I'm not going to do your homework for you, but if you present good evidence that Mattis is a Republican I will accept that conclusion. But I still want to know if he is the one who can beat Trump.
Quoting John Doe
Put some on the table who you think can beat Trump and I'm all ears.
Quoting John Doe
I've never said anything like this, and you are now just making shit up.
I don't accept that you are serious about winning if you refuse, after repeated entreaties, to do any sort of basic research on candidates you put forward for higher office.
Quoting Jake
Not when it's a basic fact about the universe. You should do your own homework.
Quoting Jake
Buddy, if you're unwilling to do your basic homework on who Jim Mattis is, his work at the Hoover Institute, his obsession with civil-military affairs being non-partisan, the role he played in helping to orchestrate the right-wing attack on Obama's deal with Iran....what's all this hogwash about "my claim" and "my homework"? You've put forward Mattis as a great candidate for the democrats. You talk as though you're interested in how to win an election and potential candidates yet you refuse to learn anything about the candidate you put forward. As I said earlier, I don't want to get into a deeper speculative conversation about the democrat's strategy in 2020 because it's been distinctly difficult and unpleasant to get you to accept basic verifiable facts about a human being that are available to you via google in less time than it takes to write a post. I can only imagine how difficult, unpleasant and time-consuming it would be to try and argue for a non-verifiable counterfactual with you when you're in attack-mode and have put this much energy into avoiding easy to look up facts.
Quoting Jake
Not what I said. He is a life-long unaffiliated (because of his deep commitment to a non-partisan military) who has spent significant time in the right-wing institute and propaganda sphere. If you read his writing and that of his right-wing academic friends (e.g. Kori Schake) it is pretty clear where he lands on the spectrum politically (neoconservative). My evidence is you should take two seconds to google that shit.
So, I genuinely understand why some of this can be confusing. Mattis, for example, backed the Iran deal while in the Trump administration because he did not want to piss of America's allies. And his current position backing continued involvement in Syria seems reasonable because he is opposing an insanely fast withdrawal and betrayal of our allies. But I think you're mistaking this for him being a democrat. All this talk of "my homework" but it's basically on you to go read up on this and learn for yourself.
Quoting Jake
You're right, I misread. Mea culpa.
WHO CAN BEAT TRUMP??
That's the first test any candidate has to pass. If they don't have a convincing strategy for beating Trump, nothing else they believe or say matters a bit.
I've offered Mattis as one possible interesting candidate. You've offered no alternative. That's the kind of sloppy thinking that will earn us 6 more years of Trump.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2018/07/06/the-top-15-democratic-presidential-candidates-for-2020-ranked-3/?utm_term=.11fd921c59d7
Michael Bloomberg is yet again considering making a move. I'd like to hear more from him, should he ever make up his mind.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2018/07/06/the-top-15-democratic-presidential-candidates-for-2020-ranked-3/?utm_term=.11fd921c59d7
I started this thread because so far at least none of the names suggested have inspired me to jump up out of my chair and yell, "YES!" Perhaps that will change as I learn more about these folks.
Meanwhile, I now confidently predict that the best candidate the Dems can run against Trump is Dick Cheney. :smile: Ok, ok, so now I'm trolling, you got me...
How typical of the arrogant and ignorant hubris that is so usual. Let's see, how many times have Americans stated (and believed) that Al Qaeda/ISIS has been successfully erased and "mission accomplished"? I count three times at least.
With this thinking, the US again snatches defeat from the jaws of victory. Has become a habit.
Al Qaeda and ISIS aren't even allied, much less the same thing. Less racism, please.
And whom was the leader of ISIS? Wasn't it Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi? Formerly known as the leader of the Al Qaeda in Iraq? You see The Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) was also known as al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), was the Iraqi division of al-Qaeda. And that ISI became ISIS. Yeah, perhaps ISIS and Ayman al-Zawahiri aren't now in speaking terms, but they surely come from the same root.
Some facts please, frank.
You're just blowing smoke. ISIS and al qaeda arent the same thing. Grouping them together is either ignorant or racist.
Peculiar how you find it racist.
Happy New Year, ssu.
That I think is the correct term to describe it: a semi-civil (war) discourse.
Meaning that Americans can hurl obscene insults and loathing across the social media, act all warlike with few hotheads even creating up a small riot for the onlooking media before the police separates the demonstration and the counter-demonstration.
I'm not in camp who forcasts that a civil war or a semi-civil war will erupt in the US. What can happen is something equivalent to the restlessness of the 1960's. Acts of sporadic violence. Home grown terrorism by individuals or small cabals of extremists. Racial riots are a possibility, like in the Detroit or later the LA riots when a totally outrageous video of police violence finally causes a true outrage in a city where racial tensions are ready to explode. Yet these kind of events are really riots, eruptions of violence and disobiediance and not the kind of violent struggle with an objective like what you have with a civil war.
In fact a civil war needs a feeling of total hopelessness, that things won't get otherwise better. This feeling is not shared only by some estranged person that has serious mental problems, but with ordinary people that otherwise would have a "normal" life. Civil war means a total collapse of the security system: if the police dissappears from the scene, people will form militias. Civil war would mean that states truly would start declaring their independence and forming their own militaries out of their National Guard units.
And civil war means that people genuinely think that killing other people, their fellow citizens, will make the country a better place to live. That is hardly happening with Trump. Or with the next person who becomes President however progressive he or she would be.
Yet the social media seem like something similar to the Ruandan genocide will soon happen in the US.
Speaking of the devil.
And now you've got me doing it too.
Ssu writes "How typical of the arrogant and ignorant hubris that is so usual."
You conveniently left out the next words that I wrote: "It probably remains as an Islamist insurgency, but the locals need to be the ones to tackle that. We don't need to become another participant in Syria's all-against-all civil war."
When we got involved, ISIS was a territorial state. It extended from east of Damascus to Mosul and from the Turkish to the Saudi borders. It had a government, treasury and judiciary. It occupied an area as large as most European countries ruling millions of people. It was expanding on all sides and seemed for a while there to be almost invincible, even threatening Baghdad. (Leading millions of Muslims around the world to believe that it had the favor of God and attracting thousands of foreigners who wanted to be part of the glory.)
Today that's all gone. ISIS holds no territory at all and its reputation for invincibility is finished. It's very hard for anyone to believe any longer that its fighters are God's chosen. Foreigners aren't rushing to join it, but to escape Syria and make their way back to wherever they came from (often Europe).
Certainly there are locals, in both Syria and Iraq that still support the Islamist ideology that it stood for, which isn't so different than the many other Islamist groups in Syria that pretty much comprise the "Syrian rebels". And there are inevitably going to be Syrians (and Iraqis) that support that kind of revolutionary religious fundamentalism.
But that's something for the Syrians and Iraqis to work out for themselves. The United States can't keep US military in these places until everyone changes their hearts and their minds. The US military is a fighting force, not an international social-change agency.
I think that the first rules of deploying military forces is to give them achievable objectives and an exit strategy.
If you disagree with me about that Ssu, perhaps you might want to encourage the European Union to replace the Americans. (There are only 2,000 Americans in Syria, Finland alone could easily replace them.) I'm not sure what mission those European troops would be given or what they would be expected to accomplish, but that would be Europe's decision to make.
I don't feel that way. The best protection the US has against Trump is his own incompetence as a head of government (as opposed to his competence as a campaigner, which was high). That's what has prevented him from achieving most of his agenda. I shudder to think what could happen with a competent extreme rightist as president. For that reason I hope Trump doesn't get driven out of office before the next election by criminal proceedings. Because if that happens, the President will be Pence, who is - from what I've heard - extreme right, yet unlike Trump, clever and competent.
Personally, I don't think Warren would win because I don't think the US is grown-up enough yet to have a female leader. I don't mean that as an insult. My own country showed back in 2010-13 that it isn't grown up enough yet for that honour either. Unlike New Zealand and Germany.
My bad, yazata.
Yet I think it's telling that Trump's special envoy to the Middle East in the battle against ISIS resigned immediately (and Trump acted as even he didn't know him). I did mention this earlier (or was it on another thread) what he said just few days before:
Furthemore, just remember how basically the US armed forces won Al Qaeda by the "Sunni Awakening" and basically backed another insurgents than Al Qaeda and truly got the Sunni's on their side. But then the US withdrew and what did the Shia regime do in Iraq? Broke every promise that Americans had done, jailed the Sunni vice-prime minister and continued sectarian policies that basically then lead to ISIS to emerge.
But the argument that "now it's time for the locals to do their share" is somewhat lacking. Just like if the US would retreat from Afghanistan and "leave it to the locals", how do you think history will see that if then in a couple of years the Taliban retakes Afghanistan?
That's actually what happened to the Soviets. Once they withdrew, it took (if I remember correctly) several years for the insurgents to overthrow the Pro-Soviet Najibullah regime. And then the country fell into anarchy and finally Pakistan got involved with a certain Proxy Group called "the students".
Well, we did just elect a black man, twice, who remains pretty popular with quite a few Americans.
I believe we could elect a woman, but a woman would face more challenges than a man, and thus she'd have to have more personal skill than Hillary Clinton, who herself was honest enough to admit she's not really a great campaigner.