President Trump: The NEW one and only politics thread

Yeah, I've been really reluctant to share my own thoughts.

 

What other sock puppets currently inhabit the board?

 

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#BoardCentrist

 

As respectfully as possible, that's bull shit. President Trump, back when he was nothing more than a Monday morning quarterback like the rest of us, didn't support such an action. Circumstances change, I understand that. I also understand that red line wasn't exactly President Obama's finest moment, even if it's a lot more complicated than simply him losing a game of chicken given the GOP backlash he would face from the type of unilateral action that Trump just employed.

I'm more hesitant to speak on behalf of all liberals than you, but I know that my initial reaction to the air strikes was an internal conflict. My cynical side felt this was an opportunistic move by Trump to control a few news cycles with something that amounted to little more than poking a hornet's nest. Yet the president seemed to be as distraught about the horrific footage of the children as most everyone else. I still think he's in over his head, but for a moment I thought I'd give him the benefit of the doubt because his sentiment seemed genuine (even if those same "children of God" were the target of his attempted terrorist prevention).

But what's the strategy going forward? It's not that we, the liberal collective, think Obama should be immune from criticism. But why is it that it must be assumed that any caution he used was weakness whereas Trump can be defended for more or less telling the world "Just let me think, dammit!" while his key people send out mixed signals? The frustrating thing for us, the liberal collective, is that Trump's bluster seemed to appeal to everyone who thought Obama was a spineless weakling. Now that it's clear that he was full of shit (where's that secret plan to defeat ISIS?) you seem to be conflating impulsiveness with leadership. If anything, this situation, in my opinion, very anticlimactically demonstrated how politically motivated the Syria outrage was by the most critical conservatives. Maybe Obama's hesitancy made things worse, I'll concede that, but what is the post-air strike strategy?

 

Yes, I understood that.

It would be just as grand of a folly to try and define anything resembling an Obama Doctrine.

 

I'm just happy that liberals will stop criticizing Trump the day he ceases to be president. Glad we can count on that.

 

Conservatives have been a shining example thus far with Obama. Just as liberals were with Bush, conservatives with Clinton, etc...

 

Which is why the complaints about such are fucking stupid.

 

This is why there shouldn't be on-the-job training in the Oval Office. He ran on simple solutions (Build a wall! Coal mining! MAGA!) when, in reality, there aren't a whole lot of them. And, yes, they may be in conflict with each other.

 

Not when you offer nothing of substance to address the issue. It's not like you had some magical alternative to Obama's overabundance of caution in Syria. You just blamed him for being weak. Now that Trump has realized your desires and it's accomplished nothing but more chaos, you have nothing. That's where the distinction is in legitimately criticizing a predecessor and being a partisan hack.

 

LOL. Who'd you vote for in 2008 between Obama and McCain?

 

Geez, never would have realized they handled things differently until you posted that. My day is complete, and it's not even noon on the Left Coast.