Obama criticizes aides for not communicating strategy against ISIS

The Washington Post reports that, on their trip back from Asia in November, the President “scolded” his staff because they aren’t communicating well enough to the American public about the White House strategy in regards to battling ISIS in Iraq and Syria.

Throughout the nine-day trip, which had begun less than 24 hours after the terrorist attacks in Paris, he had listened to critics at home and abroad charge that he had no coherent game plan. Some had even suggested that France, with tough talk and a series of retaliatory air strikes, was now leading the anti-terrorism fight.

The message they had received on the road was “jarring,” said a senior administration official who was on the flight. The problem wasn’t the strategy, they agreed. That “was clear to all of us, sitting in the Sit[uation] Room, in briefings every day. We all know what we are doing.”

What they needed was to do a better job of explaining it. Obama ordered what the official called an “uptick in our communications tempo.”

Well that’s odd, because the President’s staff kept us informed about the President’s vacation and even his appearance on Jerry Seinfeld’s show. And, since it’s been more than a month since their “scolding” I haven’t heard anything that makes the strategy more clear.

Apparently, the president had been watching news programs in Asia that weren’t members of the fawning American press and those programs made it appear that France had taken the lead against ISIS, well, I don’t have that impression, because I don’t see anyone taking the lead against ISIS. i watched his little talk to us a few weeks ago to explain his strategy and I didn’t know anything after he was done that I didn’t already know before he began.

The last time I checked, the President’s sole job is to be the face of American policy, not some bunch of lowly perfumed aides. Maybe no one has been able to unravel the President’s strategy in Iraq and Syria because we’re all so confused about the myriad of other things that the President has seemed to put ahead of the most dangerous and important national security and existential issue of our time. He’s more worried about how he’s going to disarm Americans at home than destroying the scum of ISIS. He’s more concerned about shoving that non-proliferation pact with Iran shoved down out throats. He wants to shut down Guantanamo more than he wants to shut down ISIS. The social justice warriors have his attention on women in combat, transgender troops, gays in the military than the Pentagon’s commanders have his attention. His aides all have the talking points on climate change being a national security issue, but they are more concerned about what to call ISIS, ISIL or “daesh” than how to fight the enemy. He should be leading the country, but he’s just reacting to whatever social issue dominates the news on a given day. But, you know, when Jerry Seinfeld calls, he picks up the phone.

Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden