“Desperate times call for desperate measures.”
Donald Trump won the 2016 election despite losing the popular vote by 3 million votes. Approximately thirty million eligible voters did not cast a ballot for either candidate.
Trump’s political imperative, once elected, was to broaden his appeal beyond his base supporters.
With the 2020 campaign fast approaching, our President is casting about for some accomplishment that he can claim credit for. His promised replacement of Obamacare with something better… totally bombed. He scrapped the Trans Pacific and NAFTA trade pacts, and has been unable to come up with an improved product. He promised to build an impenetrable border wall paid for by Mexico, and that hasn’t happened. He instituted tariff wars with perceived enemy states and allies, and those have proven to be a disaster economically and politically. He promised, if elected, to release his tax returns; he didn’t. He promised a Mideast Peace Plan; nothing happened.
About the only thing he’s done lately is push the United States right to the brink of a war with Iran.
Why?
It’s actually a good question. Prior to Trump, Iran was behaving modestly, at least with regard to abiding by the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, a nuclear non-proliferation agreement between Iran and the U.K., France, China, Russia and the U.S. Once elected, President Trump withdrew America’s support of the pact, and began to terrorize Iran with economic and political sanctions. The other “allied” powers in the pact are pissed at the U.S., as is Iran.
There is substantial evidence that America is using its power to effect a regime change in Tehran. National Security Advisor John Bolton has publicly admitted this, as have other Administration bigwigs.
It is apparent to anyone who pays attention to developments over there that the United States is trying mightily to goad the Iranians into some kind of incident which will justify American military intervention.
We almost succeeded this past week, when the Iranians shot down an American drone which, allegedly, flew over Iranian airspace. The drone surveillance was in response, supposedly, to Iranian attacks on merchant ships near the Strait of Hormuz.
As my father once advised me, “Don’t poke a hornets’ nest unless you’re ready to pay the consequences!”
Again, why are we determined to torment the Iranians into a war?
If we were able to affect a regime change in Iran, what would happen? America did that exact thing in Libya, Afghanistan and Iraq, and caused a shitstorm in the Middle East that continues to this day. Does anyone remember ISIS? Are things better in the Middle East after trillions of taxpayer dollars spent and untold lives lost? It doesn’t appear so, and the U.S. has been bogged down there for twenty years. President Trump announced last week that we are sending an additional 1,000 troops… for what?
Ever heard of the “Law of Unintended Consequences”? It seems to be the policy mantra of the Trump Administration. Bad ideas are substituted for good ones, then shit happens, and then different bad ideas are trotted out to replace the original ones, they don’t work, and the failure is attributed to Obama, the Democrats, “fake news”, or some other bogeyman.
In most cases, the President either lies about the fuck-up or merely re-brands the failure as a great success: another “win” for the team. His core supporters lap it up, because that’s what they do, living in the alternate reality that is the MAGA world.
But, there have been so many of these false successes that even the President knows that his bullshit and recklessness are not working to bring any of those 30 million eligible voters into his camp. He’s acting increasingly edgy lately, obviously desperate for a legitimate success that will win them over.
About the only thing that the President HAS accomplished since taking office is to re-jigger the Supreme Court in a conservative way, brand the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. as “untrustworthy”, and gut environmental, economic, and workplace regulations. These are legitimate “wins” for Trump…but they play to the same audience: the “dark state” conspiracy theorists, religious nutcases, and conservative MAGA voters, who were always going to vote for Trump in 2020.
How about kicking some smaller country’s ass? It worked for Reagan when we invaded Granada.
It appears that the President thought, this past week, that he could make some hay with a military attack against Iran, and was on the brink of doing so. However, leaders of both parties impressed upon him what a BAD IDEA it was, and, uncharacteristically, he reconsidered… for the time being.
Iran is not Granada; it is a large country, three times as populous as Iraq was under Sadaam Hussein, with considerable military resources. It would not be a pushover, and Muslims from all over the world would be supportive of Iran. And, since it is strategically important (i.e. oil), other superpowers, like Russian and China could intercede.
A limited attack on Iran may (probably, will) happen in the coming weeks to politically position Donald Trump as a decisive Commander in Chief, but a better job will have to be done by the Administration in justifying an attack. American lives will have to be lost, an American ship will have to be attacked, or the like, just like the explosion on the U.S.S. Maine in San Juan Harbor (triggering the Spanish-American War) or the Gulf of Tonkin Incident (which ushered in the Vietnam War).
I’m sure that Mr. Trump has someone working on that.
All of us should worry about this.