As always, please go to the links for the full articles/ op eds.
Even members of his own team of bumbling charlatans can't bring themselves to back up pathological liar
Donald "Cadet Bone Spurs" Trump's claim that
one two three four U.S. Embassies were under imminent threat of attack by Qassem Soleimani:
Senior
administration officials declined Sunday to confirm President Trump’s
assertion that four U.S. embassies had been targeted for attack by Iran,
while saying that Trump’s “interpretation” of the threat was consistent
with overall intelligence that justified the killing of a senior
Iranian general.
“I didn’t see one with regard to four embassies,”
Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper said of intelligence reports. “What I’m
saying is I share the president’s view that probably — my expectation
was they were going to go after our embassies,” Esper told CBS’s “Face
the Nation.”
"
Probably." Take that to the bank! (Esper also said Cadet Bone Spurs "
believed" there were four embassies under threat. That and closing your eyes, clicking your ruby slippers together and saying "
There's no place like home" will make it all come true!)
"Oddly," that information was never part of the intelligence briefing for Congress:
“I
didn’t hear anything about that,” Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who has been
sharply critical of the explanation, said of the threat to embassies.
“Several
of my colleagues have said the same,” Lee said on CNN on Sunday. “So,
that was news to me, and it certainly is not something that I recall
being raised in the classified briefing.”
Now, NBC News is reporting
there was nothing "imminent" about the Soleimani threat:
President Donald Trump authorized the killing of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani seven
months ago if Iran's increased aggression resulted in the death of an
American, according to five current and former senior administration
officials.
The presidential directive in
June came with the condition that Trump would have final signoff on any
specific operation to kill Soleimani, officials said. [snip]
The timing, however, could undermine the Trump administration's stated justification for
ordering the U.S. drone strike that killed Soleimani in Baghdad on Jan.
3. Officials have said Soleimani, the leader of the Islamic
Revolutionary Guard Corps' elite Quds Force, was planning imminent
attacks on Americans and had to be stopped.
... Asked to produce actual intelligence justifying the claims of an
“imminent” attack by Soleimani, Trump has instead provided his own
guesses. He has repeatedly suggested this was based on actual
intelligence, even though Esper now says it’s not. And in the process of
explaining Trump’s comment, Pompeo suggested the attacks on multiple
embassies were in the intelligence shared with Congress. Esper now says
not only that the multiple embassies aren’t in the intelligence, but
that even the information that Soleimani was prepared to strike one of
them wasn’t shared with the broader Congress.
Our own summation: when you're defending a pathological liar's ever- shifting lies, you lie and, in the process, you become part of the sickness. Something about "everything he touches dies."
It's no wonder
the public isn't buying Cadet Bone Spurs' ever- shifting excuse for Soleimani's demise:
In a week dominated by increased tension with Iran and speculation over
when impeachment articles would be delivered to the U.S. Senate, a
majority of Americans said they disapprove of President Trump's handling of the situation with Iran and feel less safe, according to a new ABC News/Ipsos poll. [snip]
Overall attitudes about Trump and the consequences of his actions
against Iran largely were driven by Independents, a critical target for
both parties in electoral politics. The poll showed a majority of
Independents, 57%, and all U.S. adults, 56%, disapproving of Trump's
handling of the situation with Iran, with 43% of both Independents and
U.S. adults approving. [snip]
In the aftermath of the U.S. strike, only 28% of Independents, and 25%
of Americans, said they felt more safe, while just over half, 51% of
Independents and 52% of U.S. adults, said they felt less safe.
Barry Friedman and
Dahlia Lithwick write about how Republicans in our court system are bending over backwards to
aid Trump in his impeachment obstruction and in delaying Republican lawsuits to kill the Affordable Care Act until after the 2020 election:
What’s stunning is the degree to which the courts are complicit in all
this. The courts have aided and abetted the Trump legal team and Mitch
McConnell by refusing to behave as if time is a factor in any of these
proceedings. That’s evident in the decision to docket a pair of financial records cases no earlier than March and the meandering pace of the gamesmanship around a case seeking to end the Affordable Care Act through judicial fiat. But the real coup de grâce
was the failure of the Supreme Court and lower federal courts to
resolve congressional subpoenas around the impeachment process with
alacrity when it was altogether plain what was needed. Had the courts
signaled a willingness to act at a pace befitting the needs of the
moment, Schiff might have made a different choice. Sometimes the
appearance of studied deliberation serves nihilism and chaos, even as it
pretends at neutrality and institutionalism.
More than anyone else, bone- deep- evil Moscow Mitch McConnell is responsible for packing the courts with Trump- friendly jurists (not to mention fixing the Supreme Court with Gorsuch and Kavanaugh).
We close again with the strong recommendation that you visit
Infidel 753's blog, not only for
his current link round- up, but also for his thought- provoking posts. Go!
