Trump said the only reason Baghdad was finally going for a push to free Mosul was because Hillary Clinton was running for president: "She wanted to look tough." After all, "She gave us ISIS ... she created a vacuum."
In fact that's way more complicated. Republicans blame the power vacuum in Iraq on the withdrawal of US occupation forces under Obama -- which was actually agreed upon by the government in Baghdad and the Bush administration. Yet ISIS/ISIL/Daesh, a spin-off of Zarqawi's al-Qaeda in Iraq, is most of all a direct consequence of the Dick Cheney's regime lethal Iraq adventure.
Imperial functionaries such as former NSA analyst Samantha Vinograd and former deputy director of the CIA Mike Morell subscribe to the warped notion that the rise of ISIS/ISIL/Daesh not only involves Osama bin Laden, Zarqawi and al-Baghdadi but also former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Bashar al-Assad and Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.
Clinton-aligned "experts" of this ilk would never admit that the expansion of Daesh was actually a willful decision taken by the Washington intelligence community, as revealed by former DIA head Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, currently advising Trump.
The imperturbable Dragon
Trump said, "I'm a big fan of NATO but they have to pay up." Trump -- correctly -- has called NATO "obsolete," and it's a fact most NATO members don't "pay up" as much as they should even as they whine about "Russian aggression." Hillary for her part will boost NATO no holds barred as a bulwark against "Russian aggression."
On "free" trade, Trump said, "Clinton flip-flopped on the Trans-Pacific Partnership." Correct. Hillary was always a cheerleader of TPP -- the NATO-on-trade arm of the pivot to Asia. As Secretary of State, she extolled TPP as setting "the gold standard in trade agreements to open free, transparent, fair trade, the kind of environment that has the rule of law and a level playing field. And when negotiated, this agreement will cover 40 percent of the world's total trade and build in strong protections for workers and the environment."
Yet as a candidate, she ditched TPP. But as POTUS, she will be reborn as a ferocious cheerleader.
Trump said, "the Clinton Foundation is a 'criminal enterprise.'" It's more like a fabulous slush fund/money-making racket, accepting dodgy funds from Gulf petromonarchies that do treat women in a pretty nasty way.
On criminal matters, Trump said, "General David Petraeus faces a worse deal than Clinton." What happened to Surge Poster Boy and former CIA director Petraeus is that he pled guilty to handing over classified information to his biographer/lover, and during the investigation lied to the FBI (much as Hillary also may have). Petraeus faced a worse deal than Hillary in the sense that at least he got a -- ultra-lenient -- fine (a mere $100,000, plus two years' probation) while Hillary is getting away scot free from her subterranean email server saga.
Does all of the above matter? Yes -- in the sense it further reveals what kind of POTUS will be unleashed upon the planet. But what about the (silent) Big Red Dragon in the midst of this appalling circus? The final cage match in Vegas yielded no further demonization of China. Beijing anyway is ready -- confident that no Pivoting Darth Vader in a White Pantsuit will be able to derail the Eurasian Century.
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