Monday, April 10, 2017

The next step to disaster.


NBC News April 10. 2017
SANT'ANNA DI STAZZEMA, Italy — Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, visiting a memorial to victims of Nazi atrocities in World War II, declared Monday the United States will stand up to aggressors who harm civilians, wherever they are.
Tillerson traveled to Italy as Washington seeks to rally world leaders behind a strategy to resolve the protracted civil war in Syria.
The secretary of state commenced his visit to Italy by traveling up a winding mountain road to Sant'Anna di Stazzema, the Tuscan village where the Nazis massacred more than 500 civilians during World War II.
As he laid a wreath at the site, Tillerson alluded to the chemical attack in Syria last week that triggered retaliatory U.S. airstrikes.
"We rededicate ourselves to holding to account any and all who commit crimes against the innocents anywhere in the world," Tillerson said. "This place will serve as an inspiration to us all."
(This is the worst possible news. Nation building. Being the worlds policeman. Sticking our noses in where it doesn't belong. Making enemies protecting people who want to kill us. Everything that President Trump said he wasn't going to do when he ran as an America First isolationist.

I only hope that this is the William Rodgers effect. William Rodgers was Nixon's first Secretary of State that mouthed all the pieties and conventional wisdoms of the time. The real action was with Henry Kissinger who want to China and Russia and got things done. I hope that Tillerson is not talking for the administration
If he is then President Trump if abandoning  his base and betraying the America First portion of his supporters that got him elected. A big, big mistake.)

16 comments:

The Dude said...

Nice.

So Trump is being advised by a combination of Amy Carter and that misbegotten Clinton child.

That's what you get when you elect a liberal New York democrat.

Trooper York said...

I think Tillerson stepped on his dick with this.

But we shall see.

edutcher said...

I don't recall him running as an "America First isolationist".

I do recall him saying he was going to pick his fights and not go looking for them. So far, we've heard a lot of talk and that's it.

A lot of the fine print still says he wants a political solution and Tillerson was making noises over the weekend along the lines of using Special Forces if we're going to raise anybody.

Even Dubya found there were limits on Team America, and Trump strikes me as a guy who learns from other people's mistakes. as well as his own.

I do see a lot of panic among the alt right types and they seem to be bailing before they really see where this is going. I noted with some bemusement, when Trump was asked why the airfield runway wasn't targeted, that he said runways are easily repaired.

This guy is not being led around by the nose.

Trooper York said...

Ed you are incorrect. A major part of his appeal to working class Americans was that he was going to spend money on America. On jobs for Americans. Not intervening in every shithole like Syria. He chose the term "America First." It was not bestowed upon him. He picked it. He is smart enough to know what it means.

If he repudiates it he will lose that most rabid part of his base. Steve Bannon. Ann Coulter. Vox Day. Me.

I don't think he wants to do that.

chickelit said...

Trump is reverting and not to the mean. I wonder if he was profoundly affected by Don Rickles's death?

Trooper York said...

He likes praise. I hope he is not fooled by the praise of the press and the Democrats.

ricpic said...

Hey, let me get this straight, first you antagonize the Russians and then your NSC chief McMaster says the United States is going for regime change to oust Assad AND to take out ISIS. Aside from the enormity of such a double undertaking that GUARANTEES war with Assad's protector, Russia. This is true neocon madness and if Trump doesn't go before the country and declare that his missile strike was a one off and he WILL NOT authorize an invasion of Syria...well, we will fall into a horror vortex from which we will not emerge.

edutcher said...

As I recall, McMaster said Trump wants a political solution.

Trooper York said...

Ed you are incorrect. A major part of his appeal to working class Americans was that he was going to spend money on America. On jobs for Americans. Not intervening in every shithole like Syria. He chose the term "America First." It was not bestowed upon him. He picked it. He is smart enough to know what it means.

Bombing an airfield isn't intervention (having lived through the buildup in 'Nam, I know it when I see it).

That said, he also told people that, yes, Americans would come first, but he was also going to rebuild the military. Is that intervention?

And I don't recall him saying we would retire from the world the way the America Firsters thought we could after WWI (and, no, America First does not automatically mean we want to be Charles Lindbergh, though some people may think otherwise).

Right now, I see the head of Red China offering Trump trade concessions. Not a yuge thing, but he has their attention.

Not unlike Reagan. Those who were around then will remember the crazies in Iran were sufficiently scared, they released our hostages as he took the oath of office. How much of what he and his Administration are saying now is for effect, only time will tell, but I'm taking a wait and see approach, myself.

edutcher said...

Something just hit me.

What if Trump did this, knowing everybody would be talking about it, while he worked out a real IdiotCare repeal and got it through with little fanfare?

Just a thought.

Trooper York said...

I don't expect him to be a Charles Lindbergh America First kind of guy. We could never be that lucky.

Rebuilding the military doesn't mean squandering 56 million dollars in armaments because some third world despot exterminated some cockroaches with RAID. I repeat. It is none of our business. If Assad wants to make more "good Muslims" why should we get involved with that. It is a civil war. Let them fight it out.

Look at who is praising this jerk off move to the sky. McCain, Graham and Little Marco. ABC, NBC, CBS and the main stream media. That is enough to tell you that it was exactly the wrong thing to do.

Trooper York said...

McMasters is looking like more and more of a disaster. He is leading President Trump down the garden path of intervening in places we have no business in being. Ever.

edutcher said...

I notice the alt right is freaking out over this guy, but you look for facts and most of what you get is guilt by association and a whole lot of innuendo from the Lefties' old fave, unnamed sources.

He may in fact turn out to be a disaster, but I'd like some evidence rather than just a lot of hysteria.

Trooper York said...

Look at who is praising this jerk off move to the sky. McCain, Graham and Little Marco. ABC, NBC, CBS and the main stream media. That is enough to tell you that it was exactly the wrong thing to do.

Just because they're for it doesn't mean it's automatically bad. Stopped clocks, and all that. Why they like it and why Trump did it may be entirely different things. If some Lefties are right and the Russia card is lost to the Demos, I can't imagine anything that would distress Grahmanesty, Junior, and Little Marco more than losing a chance to reach across the aisle to their friends in the Democrat party.

I don't expect him to be a Charles Lindbergh America First kind of guy. We could never be that lucky.

Lindbergh was a eugenicist and, if not a Nazi, then a Nazi sympathizer.

The last thing you want is another Lindbergh.

ndspinelli said...

Baghdad Ed.

edutcher said...

And which statement I made was false?

Trooper York said...

Lindbergh was an American hero smeared by the media. Just like anyone who stands against the duopoly.

Trooper York said...

What you said about McCain and Graham is wrong Ed. Dead wrong. Anything they are for is automatically bad.