Defense Secretary Mark Esper explicitly said Sunday that he had seen no hard evidence that four American embassies had been under possible threat when President Donald Trump authorized the targeting of Iran’s top commander, raising questions about the scale of the threat described by Trump last week.
https://www.fox23.com/news/politics/esper-has-seen-no/RLDAP4UXXUZ62MENXMBNLJXDZA/
Nothing like keeping the Defense Secretary in the dark when attacking another country. I guess that explains why Congress didn’t even get the message through the “gang of 8”, who are the intelligence core and strictly bi-partisan.
This might make more sense:
“President Donald Trump openly discussed how the U.S. airstrike assassination of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani would shore up support from Republican Senate hawks in time for his impeachment trial, according to reports in both The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.”
“Trump’s reported perspective on the impeachment implications of the controversial attack is one more aspect of a confusing jumble of reasons the White House has presented for the hit.”
If hustling to get an investigation in Ukraine to benefit his re-election didn’t fly, maybe he could kill someone to get a favorable jury in the Senate.
Is there no cap on this regime’s blatant attempts to circumvent the law?
Tidewater News and Opinion Forum 
Why would anyone think that one, let alone four, of our embassies were under the threat of a terrorist attack?
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Because…uh, um…well…because “I said so, dammit…and, and…”everybody knows that…”.
On the lighter side, what bothers me most about Trump is not that he lies, cheats, exaggerates, misleads, insults but rather that he has absolutely no respect for Americans.
And by logical extension, America.
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It is amazing how far people will go to oppose anything Trump does, even killing someone who so desperately needed killing.
We’re talking about a terrorist with the blood of thousands on his hands, hundreds of those Americans, who was illegally in Iraq and certainly not to to spread peace and goodwill.
So, do we really wait for dead certainty he is working on an imminent attack 4 embassies or is probably one or more sufficient?
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@Tabor
” . . . who was illegally in Iraq and certainly not to to spread peace and goodwill.”
So, his flying openly into Baghdad’s International Airport and the Premier of Iraq publicly stating that he was on a known diplomatic mission cannot penetrate your thick hide of partisan blindness? Prefer your alternative facts I see.
If we were at war with Iran, attacking and killing a leading government official might be justified. We are not at war with Iran and conducting such an assassination – a obvious act of war – on FALSE pretenses is an egregious abuse of Presidential authority and on its own is a compelling reason for removal from office. We do not need a weak and lawless President dragging the men and women our armed services into harms way on childish whims.
Funny how readily you abandon Libertarian Party positions on behalf of this shameless huckster. What is up with that?
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Sure kill the bastard.
Just don’t lie about it to Americans, or Congress or even the DOD chief.
Is it that hard to grasp.
I don’t miss Suleimani, I just miss knowing what the #@&% our own government is doing even afterwards. And they did lie and shift stories all over the place.
That is ok with you?
And now we hear via the WSJ that he may have timed the killing to get favorable jury votes in the Senate from the Hawks.
What kind of scum does that?
We know.
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You should your own links more carefully: “Both Esper and O’Brien said they agreed that Iran might have hit more than just the U.S. Embassy in the Iraqi capital. But Esper, when asked whether there was a specific piece of evidence, replied: ‘I didn’t see one with regard to four embassies.’ And in response to a question about whether Trump was ’embellishing’ the threat, Esper said, ‘I don’t believe so.'”
Your speculations about the president are just guesses.
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@Roberts
Anyone can make a list of horrible things that Iran MIGHT do but that is not the thresh hold for the War Powers ACT allowing unilateral Presidential acts of war. It reads as follows . . .
“The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to
(1) a declaration of war,
(2) specific statutory authorization, or
(3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.”
None of these conditions were met. There was no national emergency if there was no real imminent attack and there wasn’t. It was a lie.
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RE: “None of these conditions were met.”
Don’t care because it doesn’t matter. The War Powers Act, as statutory law, is inferior to the Constitution. The president complied with the terms of the Act 100% in any case.
If you think the president gave an illegal order to kill Soleimani, then more power to you in delusion, I guess. Maybe you can pursue legal action against every military operative in the chain of command who carried out that order.
I laugh in your face, Murphy.
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“I laugh in your face, Murphy.”
Oh yes, a moronic laugh.
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Congress (the legislative branch) abdicated that and other Constitutional responsibilities to Presidents Trump, Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Regan, Carter, Ford, etc. (the Executive branch) long ago.
Maybe it’s time for the SCOTUS (the Judicial branch) to make a ruling?
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Political hogwash trying to say the president was lying without actually saying he was lying.
There is no excuse for the wavering, differing BS excuses in the first place. I think there were 5 different reasons at last count.
What did you expect Esper to say. The truth? That Trump was lying through his teeth.
You are not that naive.
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RE: “You are not that naive.”
I hope not. I try not to be delusional, either.
Trump’s “four embassies” comment occurred during an interview with Laura Ingraham. He said, “I can reveal that I believe it would have been four embassies.”
It is hard to make a big lie out of that, as you attempt to do.
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I am not making a big lie out of anything,
Trump is.
“I do it to discredit you all and demean you all so that when you write negative stories about me no one will believe you.’”
Confuse the electorate.
He has nothing but contempt for his fellow citizens and like his father, contempt for America.
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Personal experience-most of what’s presented during “intel briefs” are assessments (read: not hard evidence) regardless of their classification level.
My assessment (best guess) of which US Embassies were to be targeted by Soleimani’s IRGC and Quds proxies would be Israel, Lebanon, Oman, Syria and Yemen.
Obviously, there’d be more attacks against our embassy in Iraq…just watch the news.
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Let’s stipulate that the Middle East is full of threats to Americans from all sorts of groups and that some of them are strongly supported by Iran. The point is that there was not an “imminent threat” and certainly no such threat that would be removed by this assassination. If there actually were “terrorist” plans in motion for such attacks, this assassination would make them more likely and not less. There was no “national emergency created by attack upon the United States.”
The War Powers Act sets the conditions under which the President may undertake acts of war against another country on his own initiative. Those conditions were not met. That such action was taken base on a lie is a BFD.
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If Mr. Trump and his National Security Team had said something to the effect that “Our intelligence assessment showed that Soleimani and Iranian proxies were planning imminent attacks on several of our embassies and it was decided the best way to thwart that threat was to remove him” then I could see a way clear. But because of the back and forth and ever-shifting information, it appears as if the administration, AGAIN, lied to we, the people, and our elected representatives. That and the lack of transparency in briefing Congress just makes it appear convoluted and a simple cluster bomb of bull shit.
When someone like Mike Lee takes issue with a briefing of this magnitude, you have to scratch your head and say “WTF?”.
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As I have said many times, Trump and his regime have no respect for Americans.
He doesn’t respect their intelligence and his constant lying and misleading is evidence of that.
As Leslie Stahl found out, he want to purposely confuse his own citizens so they won’t know who or what to believe.
That is not respect, that is contempt.
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Yet his supporters refuse to see what is so blatantly true. And that interview with Stahl was ‘fake news’ in their limited thinking.
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“Israel, Lebanon, Oman, Syria and Yemen”
Then, it’s a brief left over from Reagan?
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What amazes me is that so many left wing arm chair generals think they know what is going on from what the WaPo, NYT or any “news” outlet tells them much less a sanitized news release. Quite frankly You Don’t Know Schitt. Having been in theater numerous times and compared what happened vs what the news reported they are clueless but desperate to make a breathless breaking news story. Perhaps lefties might finally come to terms with the fact that, no matter the administration, they do not have “the need to know” and never will.
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@Bobr
I can share the experience you describe – though not “in theater.” But almost every time I have had personal knowledge of something in the news, the reports about it have contained errors, mistakes or omissions. However, the difference between outlets such as NYT, WAPO, PBS, etc and the media of the Trumpiverse such as Fox or Talk Radio is that such misinformation is not deliberate and is corrected when pointed out. This is the difference between “news” and “propaganda.” “News” is anchored in reality. “Propaganda” need not be.
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Yes, there are intelligence items that are not for public dissemination.
There is no reason to BS the American citizens with 5 different stories in about 72 hours as to why we risked war with Iran.
It makes no difference if you are Republican or Democrat, Americans deserve the truth. Particularly those who are going to fight for us. Any president or administration that hold its citizens in contempt, as this one does by lying and trying to confuse, is not even close to being patriotic. And that is the hard truth.
Your childish insults are nothing but a reflection of your character, BTW. And, unfortunately, they are not original since our president has already apparently impressed the impressionable with their “cleverness”.
IMHO
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