Now that he’s busy trying to swat away polling that shows him losing in head-to-head matchups with more than a handful of the myriad Democrats who will be vying to take him on in 2020, Donald Trump seems to be peering at the dawning realization that without something legacy-defining that happens soon, he will be a one-term President.
Maybe you think he doesn’t actually like being President, and that’s why he hasn’t spent even one minute ever learning how to be one. But something that he would like even less than being President is going to prison — and that’s a distinct possibility once he’s no longer in office. That means he’s got to come up with something big, and soon.
Unfortunately, it looks like he’s chosen the route some of his predecessors took: He wants to be a wartime President. Nobody wants to change leaders in the middle of a war, right? And just as many of us expected as soon as he pulled out of the nuclear deal negotiated by the Obama administration, it looks like he wants war with Iran, the largest non-ally nation in the middle east by both size and population.
First there was the pullout from the nuclear deal, during which Trump did more than just insinuate that Iran was incapable of holding up their end of. Then we learned how deep the ties are between the Trump family and Saudi Arabia — bitter enemies with Iran for a number of reasons — and that Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner have been trying to send nuclear technology to the kingdom for essentially Trump’s entire presidency thus far.
But when a pair of oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz exploded last week, American authorities were quick to blame Iran, despite serious controversy and even global disagreement over whether the attack may have been staged or caused by something other than the official explanation, Iranian mines.
Today, Trump ramped it up even more.
“Iran to defy Uranium Stockpile Limits”
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 17, 2019
An enigmatic single tweet, presumably quoting some headline he read or a line he heard someone say on Fox News. Of course, technically, there are no stockpile limits for Iran now, because Trump pulled out of the deal that imposed them, which Iran had previously adhered to.
All of that, however, makes one wonder what the unspoken text was during Trump’s exclusive interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos when he talked about who attacked America on 9/11:
And, by the way, Iraq did not knock down the World Trade Center. It was not Iraq. It were other people. And I think I know who the other people were. And you might also.”
Trump is not saying Iran explicitly. He’s also not saying — and is never going to say — Saudi Arabia, despite the fact that 17 of the 19 hijackers that day were from the peninsular kingdom. In fact, there’s no reason at all for him to bring up the identity of the attackers, especially in some vague, roundabout way, unless it is to attempt to get people to fill in the blank with the words he’s not saying.
“I think I know”? Mr. President, we all know. And it wasn’t Iran.
Featured image via screen capture
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