CDZ Trump speech review

[Toronado3800]

Its a bit petty and sure he flipped on the issue but he has made some sense.

He touched base on the racism issue at the beginning almost like an apology for the last couple weeks.

His mention of including some future taliban in peace talks probably upsets some folks.

The "we are spending billiona to defreat you" part might kinda encourage those supporting terrorism as a means of weakening us.

The God talk from him is kinda funny.

Thats it. Not terrible.

 

[JGalt]

Whut? You left out the best parts:

1. No more nation-building, just killing terrorists.

2. They don't know when, where, and how we're going to kill them.

3. Pakistan is going to pull their heads out of their asses or we cut off funding to them.

 

[BULLDOG]

Whut? You left out the best parts:

1. No more nation-building, just killing terrorists.

2. They don't know when, where, and how we're going to kill them.

3. Pakistan is going to pull their heads out of their asses or we cut off funding to them.

2.) Trump has no idea when, where, or how he wants to do it either.

 

[william the wie]

Gail was busy watching the rather meager Eclipse shows so I missed the speech entirely.

 

[Compost]

For those who are interested, here's the speech.
Full Transcript and Video: Trump’s Speech on Afghanistan

 

[gipper]

More war. What a surprise.

The Oligarchy and MIC always win and the American people lose.

 

[usmbguest5318]

More war. What a surprise.

The Oligarchy and MIC always win and the American people lose.

MIC? Men In Charge?

 

[gipper]

More war. What a surprise.

The Oligarchy and MIC always win and the American people lose.

MIC? Men In Charge?

Military Industrial Complex.

 

[usmbguest5318]

The speech:

​

He touched base on the racism issue at the beginning almost like an apology for the last couple weeks.

I take it you mean these words:

"When one part of America hurts, we all hurt. And when one citizen suffers an injustice, we all suffer together. Loyalty to our nation demands loyalty to one another. Love for America requires love for all of its people. When we open our hearts to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice, no place for bigotry and no tolerance for hate."
​

Frankly, I see those remarks as platitudinous for they are so similar to words he used in his inaugural address only to nonetheless and in the wake of "C-ville" make the remarks he did about "good people on both sides," and so on. One will recall that at his inauguration he said:

"At the bedrock of our politics will be a total allegiance to the United States of America, and through our loyalty to our country, we will rediscover our loyalty to each other. When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice. The Bible tells us, 'how good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity.'"​

Trump's lifelong litany of racist expressions cannot be reversed by a few short sentences. What you call an apology I call pandering, for political purposes, to something in which he doesn't genuinely believe.

Moreover, who the hell believes patriotism is the antithesis of prejudice? Of all the ones I've heard in my life, that may very well be the most insipid notion of how to dispel the parti pris that maligns our polity. I mean really. Who ever asserted something like, "Well, I rallied around the flag and that has made me see that my fear-and-hate-filled notions of bigotry, white supremacy and so on were unfounded and wrong?"

Quite simply the way to apologize is to directly and unambiguously apologize and then show a behavior pattern, greater in length/frequency and substance than that of the errant behavior for which one apologizes, of not making the same mistake in form and substance.

Thoughts on other things Trump said:

General observations:

• In a speech focused on defeating/eradicating terrorism and ISIS et al in A-stan, the words "radical Islamic terrorism" did not appear.
• Throughout the speech, Trump made statements that indicate he's not nearly as well informed on the matter as he claimed, claimed in the speech and in the years before becoming POTUS when he ranted like a child about A-stan.
• A-stan policy is substantively unchanged from what it was under Obama. What was the point of the speech?
  • To change the nation's focus from race?
  • To publicly and officially threaten Pakistan both directly and indirectly as consequence of increased US-India connectedness of sorts?
  • To encourage India to buy more US-made weapons and strengthen its U.S. ties and signal to China that the U.S. has other trading-partner "options" in the Southeastern Asian region?
  • A roundabout way to boost his approval ratings, particularly among the undeniably large swath of the American polity that doesn't routinely read foreign policy publications, doesn't have the good fortune to have "over the garden fence" chit chats with diplomats and international relations experts, and that quite probably has never spent any "living time" outside of U.S. or North America? (My primary point in asking this question isn't to ridicule folks for not doing those things or having such opportunities. I'll admit to there being a minor and tacit intent of indirectly chiding what appears common for Trump and lots of other Americans: having strong and often publicly aired opinions on a topic they don't -- not barely do, but truly just don't -- well comprehend.)
  • Something else? Who the hell knows?

My original instinct was to pull out, and historically I like following my instincts. But all my life, I have heard that decisions are much different when you sit behind the desk in the Oval Office.

Alright. I have to give him credit for owning that he's changing his mind. I think he should also have apologized to Obama for having made a variety of remarks such as these:

• 2015 -- A suicide bomber has just killed U.S. troops in Afghanistan. When will our leaders get tough and smart. We are being led to slaughter!
• 2014 -- Now Obama is keeping our soldiers in Afghanistan for at least another year. He is losing two wars simultaneously.
• 2013 -- Do not allow our very stupid leaders to sign a deal that keeps us in Afghanistan through 2024-with all costs by U.S.A.
• 2012 -- Afghanistan is a total disaster. We don't know what we are doing.

Like healthcare/health insurance, foreign policy is complicated. This is now the second topic on which we've observed that Trump has relied on instinct rather than on intellect and in the aftermath discovered his instincts on the matter weren't worth the bits and bytes used to express them.
​

Today, 20 U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organizations are active in Afghanistan and Pakistan....The threat is worse because Pakistan and India are two nuclear-armed states, whose tense relations threaten to spiral into conflict, and that could happen.

• Assuming that's so, how many terrorist organizations are in A-stan? The primary focus of the speech is the situation in A-stan and U.S. policy regarding it, right?
• <head snap> Wait a minute? What? And out of left-field comes India....in a speech about the U.S.' military policy in Afghanistan....
  
  Really? There may be some some relevant reason to mention India in the speech, but for Christ's sake, Trump needed to tell us what the hell he "instincts" it is. China (the big yellow country on the map below) and India also have "tense relations." (See also: China-India Relations Worsen Rapidly) China even shares a border with Afghanistan and the Uighur people in western china have more culturally in common with people of the "Stans" than they do with Hans who comprise a 90%+ majority of China. (The PRC government is keen on P-stan, but the Chinese people generally aren't, thus is manifest yet another indication of the ethnic animus between Hans and Uighurs.)
  
  
  
  
  
  Anyway, why Trump tossed India into his remarks in the way and where he did is anyone's guess.
  • Does it derive from something having to do with India's legitimate role and need for peace in the region?
  • Does it have something to do with India and Afghanistan's strategic partnership?
  • Is it a early salvo to foment and lay foundations more popular disdain against Indians, discord that Trump will use later when he starts talking in earnest about trade and labor policy?
    • 8 Biggest H-1B Employers In 2015
      
    • India And China Accounted For 82% Of U.S. H-1B Visas In 2016
      
      
      

When I became president, I was given a bad and very complex hand, but I fully knew what I was getting into. Big and intricate problems.

• "Bad and comlex hand?"
  Excuse me?!?!? Nothing could be farther from the truth. The stock market had shown some 80 months of unbroken net gains, unemployment was at or below 5%, and structural unemployment in the U.S. is 4%, people, despite GOP assertions to the contrary, were beginning to realize that O-care wasn't such a terrible thing after all (as evidenced by the fact that they don't want to give it up now that the GOP holds Congress and the WH), and global respect for the U.S. had recovered from the Bush years.
• "I fully knew what I was getting into."
  Yeah, sure. An accurate statement would have been "I thought I knew what I was getting into."
  • "Who knew healthcare was so complex?"
  • "My original instinct was to pull out [of A-stan]." and "I know more than the generals."
  • "We're going to build a wall and Mexico's going to pay for it." -- Still haven't figured out how to make that happen, have you?
  • You knew so much that even now you have provided precious few details about any major policy.

Conditions on the ground, not arbitrary timetables, will guide our strategy from now on.

Okay. What are the conditions that will militate for the U.S. ending its active military role in A-stan? Does Trump even know what specifically those conditions are or ought to be? I don't need to know the details of our tactical plans -- if they work, it'll be ages before we know of them and if they don't, there'll be plenty of discussion about them -- but I and the rest of the American people deserve to know what be the bar that our efforts must hurdle so we know when we're done. The "finish line" has to be defined even if the way one will "run the race" isn't laid out publicly.
​

Another fundamental pillar of our new strategy is the integration of all instruments of American power: diplomatic, economic, and military, toward a successful outcome. Someday, after an effective military effort, perhaps it will be possible to have a political settlement that includes elements of the Taliban and Afghanistan, but nobody knows if or when that will ever happen.

• Yes, dear, though possibly new to Trump and/or his similarly willfully ignorant band of nescient and taradiddling Trumpkins, DIME is not new. It's what the U.S. implemented throughout the Obama years.
  • Blood and Faith in Afghanistan
• Negotiating with the Taliban also is not a new idea. Obama tried it too. The question is what has Trump to offer that Obama didn't? We know from the healthcare mess that Trump is nowhere near being the great negotiator he claims...If one cannot get one's countrymen to consensus on a major policy matter, how the hell is one going to get non-allied combatants to concur with one's desires
  • Reconciling with the Taliban
  • U.S. Taliban Talks
• Then there's the issue of how Trump's Administration can be construed as trustworthy by anyone with whom it enters into talks. Trump himself has dissed and dogged some of his most ardent public supporters and commenced on a path of alienating the country's most faithful allies. If that's how he treats friends, "family" and allies, why would anyone not part of one of those groups expect he'd treat them any better?

From now on, victory will have a clear definition — attacking our enemies, obliterating ISIS, crushing al-Qaida, preventing the Taliban from taking over Afghanistan and stopping mass terror attacks against America before they emerge.

So, the U.S. focus under Trump will be to use A-stan as a "base" for achieving U.S. military objectives, and the U.S. will dispense with the so-called nation-building activities of building schools, roads, power plants and the like. Now there's a "win-win" proposition that Afghans are sure to embrace. NOT!

Of course, Trump's rhetoric about eschewing nation-building plays well with naively myopic Trumpkins who don't at all have the first idea of international relations, diplomacy, how to conduct either or how to foment positive relationships with peoples and nations that aren't Western European. Indeed, one wonders whether Trump yet understands the difference between hawkish interventionalism and nation-building. His rhetoric suggests he absolutely does not.
​

As the prime minister of Afghanistan has promised...

There is no prime minister of A-stan and the country hasn't had one since 1997....So much for Trump knowing what he's talking about. How does one make that sort of mistake in a prepared speech? Who that does know something, including the most basic details such as whether the country's head of state is a prime minister or president, about A-stan proofread the thing?
​

However, our commitment is not unlimited, and our support is not a blank check. The government of Afghanistan must carry their share of the military, political and economic burden. The American people expect to see real reforms, real progress and real results.

The Pentagon has long stated, and as yet not recanted or amended those statements, that it'll be years before A-stan can govern itself without U.S assistance.

• Pentagon: Afghan forces need further development and continued US help
  
• US Reconstruction Aid for Afghanistan: The Dollars and Sense
  
• Afghanistan: Post-Taliban Governance, Security, and U.S. Policy
  
• Quarterly Report of the Special Inspector General [SIGAR] for Afghanistan Reconstruction (Past SIGAR reports, investigations and audits can be found here: SIGAR | Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction)

Accordingly, Trump’s declaration that Kabul must carry its own weight, though a familiar message in American A-stan policy rhetoric, having no new details here about what Kabul must do or what Trump’s administration would do if the Afghans doesn't or cannot, is as empty as a winter rain barrel.
​

So there you go, OP-er....That's my review/analysis of Trump's speech. I know you didn't ask for it, but as I've read and listened to the speech, I figured I'd volunteer my thoughts and what I found when confirming whether it held any noteworthy substance.

 

[usmbguest5318]

More war. What a surprise.

The Oligarchy and MIC always win and the American people lose.

MIC? Men In Charge?

Military Industrial Complex.

Thank you for the clarification.