Unforeseen Contingencies

President Donald Trump has told Iran's "Supreme Leader" Khamenei that he must "unconditionally surrender."  Good.  The civilized world ought not tolerate savages and dictators who threaten freedom and peace of the rest of the world.  The Iranian government, a pack of belligerent religious loons on a quest for nuclear bombs, needs to be put down.  If Iran doesn't surrender, it's time for the USAF to drop some GBU-57 bombs on Fordow.

Powerline Blog and Ace of Spades HQ have included in their coverage of these events the outrage of the isolationist (and increasingly anti-Semitic) wing of Trump's supporters, such as Tucker Carlson. Here's an example from Ace at AosHQ, and here's a piece with a brief mention from John Hinderaker of Powerline.   

I think Donald Trump has a remarkable characteristic: to a very unusual degree, he seems to be a sort of mirror in which people project their imaginations.  While mostly we see this with his detractors on the left, certainly the isolationists imagined Trump was one of them.  A number of Tucker Carlson fans have told me so.  They also have told me that no one who cares about America should give a flip about Israel, about October 7, about Iran having nuclear weapons, about anything Russia does to Ukraine or Europe, or anything else abroad.  And any of us who do care are "neocon warmongers."

I'm not a neocon or a warmonger, it's simply obvious that liberty is essential and all these things the isolationists say we should ignore are very serious threats to liberty.  It's also hard to understand how anyone who pays attention could think Trump is an isolationist who thinks these things.  He has always emphasized that his first loyalty is to America, but also he understands that America is the leader of  world.  Trump '45 was certainly not anti-Israel; he moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, a thing to which other presidents had paid lip service.  Trump reversed Obama's policy and gave deadly weapons such as Javelin missiles to Ukraine to kill Russians.  Trump authorized attacks in Syria that killed at least 200 Russian soldiers of the Wagner Group and also destroyed at least 25% of Syria's combat aircraft.  In Iran, IRGC Gen. Soleimani was blown to pieces at Trump's order.  And Trump changed the rules of engagement established by Obama, allowing the U.S. military to destroy Daesh (ISIS).

But with Trump, people seem not to pay attention.  Instead, they seem to see what they want to see.  Apparently Khamenei was not immune, and now he and his regime have fallen through the looking glass, and into the fires of hell.

// posted by Charles N. Steele @ 23:09