We should never have made the deal with Iran that the Obama Administration made. It was a bad deal. I agreed with the Republican candidates, including Donald Trump, in the 2016 election, who said it was a bad deal and that we should withdraw from it as soon as possible, and I disagreed with those who said now that we are in it, we need to remain in it and make the best of it.
I agreed that we needed to be tough with North Korea and make them understand, in no uncertain terms, that we were prepared to take action if/when we deemed it necessary to prevent them from obtaining a delivering system that could put nuclear bombs within our continent.
I agreed that we needed to increase our efforts to demolish ISIS.
It appears that we are making great progress on all of these issues through the efforts of the Trump Administration.
So why can’t I celebrate these apparent great steps as so many on the right are doing? Steps that if it were any other Republican President, I would very likely be praising and celebrating?
Trump supporters would simply say I have TDS and just can’t get myself to give Trump any credit for anything. Perhaps. I will admit to being very jaded by my bias against Trump.
However, I don’t think that’s it, to be honest. My biggest problem is that I just have no confidence in Trump’s ability to manage these things. I’ve witnessed too much of his dishonesty, his ignorance about nearly all issues and unwillingness to do the work to learn, and his extreme need for self-aggrandizement.
I believe these characteristics to be a recipe for disaster when dealing with such sensitive issues.
Again, if it was Cruz, or pretty much any other of the Republican candidates, I’d have more faith that they were actually fully engaged in learning and knowing about all of the important issues surrounding these hot issues and the ramifications of what he’s doing. I would not be wondering if he’s doing this against the advice of those who actually know more than he does about it. I would not be wondering if there were other, personal reasons that he is taking such actions.
It seems to me that he was unable to convince any of our allies that are also a part of the Iran deal to go along with this. Either that, or he didn’t even try. In either case, that seems a bit foolish. Therefore, I don’t have confidence that he did the proper diplomatic work that should be done prior to making such an announcement.
I also don’t have confidence that he won’t simply change his mind tomorrow. Again, I wouldn’t have that particular worry with any of the others. That possibility is well-founded based on his history, so it’s not simply TDS talking.
Now, I may very well be wrong about all of this. Trump may have done all of his homework and listened very carefully to all of his advisers who know all about these things. He may have made great efforts to convince our allies and they are simply wrong in not joining us. He may have very sound, detailed plans for how to proceed from here with Iran, and North Korea, and ISIS and all of the other issues he faces.
I just have no confidence in that…based on my observations of him over the past couple of years.
I wish I could be celebrating these things. I really do. But I’ve not seen anything from him yet to alleviate my concerns.
In the meantime, I will recognize these are generally good developments, or at least would be in normal circumstances, and I’ll try to be cautiously optimistic, and yet skeptical in believing it’s time for celebration.
