Obama Says U.S. Intelligence Underestimated Islamic State threat

[UncleBeer 244]

I don't need to produce proof to counteract a claim that is untenable.

I make specific points and ask direct questions that would be easily answered in a real dialogue, and you answer "Nuh-uh". If you had counterarguments, you'd provide 'em.

Take your claim that Obama sympathizes with the enemies of Obama as an example. Anyone can put forward that as an idea, but the person making that claim is the one that needs to provide credible evidence. The default position (IE what is tenable) is that the US president (whoever the incumbent happens to be) is not going to sympathize with the enemies of the USA, that's a self evident truth. If you want to make that claim you need to produce some credible evidence that not only is it possible that a US president would sympathize with its enemies, you need to provide concrete proof of actions that were taken in the capacity of president that demonstrate this sympathy. The failure to detect a terrorist threat in Bengazi isn't credible evidence of your claim, just in case you thought that was going to be your go to evidence. What that might be evidence of is a failure within US intelligence, but that's highly unlikely. The most plausible explanation is that the attack was opportunistic.

As I say, the possibility still exists that he's just the fool: the incredibly inept administrator who not only can't make the right decision, but seems to always reach for the wrong option first: the "anti-Midas" effect. After six years of this though, it's hard to imagine anyone being quite that inept or unlucky, so it's increasingly hard to avoid the knave conclusion. And the media begins to notice: he doesn't give a flip about what the American people want; he's got a pen and he's got a phone and he'll sign whatever diktats he pleases (aka: "dictator").

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

The only deniers here are the ones who thought knocking over Iraq was a good idea.

[Teddy B 17,252]

You're a Libertarian, but you need the Republican's to accomplish what you want since your party really doesn't have any clout.

The International Brotherhood of Taxi Drivers carry some serious clout.

Edited September 29, 2014 by Teddy B

[UncleBeer 244]

Back to the original topic. Even more lies from the preznit:

Why Obama Can’t Say His Spies Underestimated ISIS

On “60 Minutes,” the president faulted his spies for failing to predict the rise of ISIS. There’s one problem with that statement: The intelligence analysts did warn about the group.

Nearly eight months ago, some of President Obama’s senior intelligence officials were already warning that ISIS was on the move. In the beginning of 2014, ISIS fighters had defeated Iraqi forces in Fallujah, leading much of the U.S. intelligence community to assess they would try to take more of Iraq.

But in an interview that aired Sunday evening, the president told 60 Minutes that the rise of the group now proclaiming itself a caliphate in territory between Syria and Iraq caught the U.S. intelligence community off guard. Obama specifically blamed James Clapper, the current director of national intelligence: “Our head of the intelligence community, Jim Clapper, has acknowledged that, I think, they underestimated what had been taking place in Syria,” he said.

Reached by The Daily Beast after Obama’s interview aired, one former senior Pentagon official who worked closely on the threat posed by Sunni jihadists in Syria and Iraq was flabbergasted. “Either the president doesn’t read the intelligence he’s getting or he’s bullshi++ing,” the former official said.

Clapper did tell The Washington Post’s David Ignatius this month that he underestimated the will of the ISIS fighters in Iraq and overestimated the ability of Iraq’s security forces in northern Iraq to counter ISIS. (He also said his analysts warned about the “prowess and capability” of the group.)

Still, other senior intelligence officials have been warning about ISIS for months. In prepared testimony before the annual House and Senate intelligence committees’ threat hearings in January and February, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, the recently departed director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, said the group would likely make a grab for land before the end of the year. ISIS “probably will attempt to take territory in Iraq and Syria to exhibit its strength in 2014.” Of course, the prediction wasn’t exactly hard to make. By then, Flynn noted, ISIS had taken the cities of Ramadi and Fallujah, and the demonstrated an “ability to concurrently maintain multiple safe havens in Syria.”

[decocker 7,198]

There are varying degrees of willingness to lie to achieve an agenda. O'bama's is unmatched. To say otherwise is to merely serve as an apologist.

it's really quite obivous that obama holds a special spot in your heart so i see why you find him so unique. but he's no better /no worse than any other president we've had prior. don't know if you've noticed, we just keep repeating the same mistakes as a country - it ain't one president.

[UncleBeer 244]

it's really quite obivous that obama holds a special spot in your heart so i see why you find him so unique.

You didn't really address what I wrote; only responded with moral relativism.

[decocker 7,198]

You didn't really address what I wrote; only responded with moral relativism.

moral relativism may be what you see, but i see someone with an unhealthy fixation that serves no purpose other than to complain. there there, before you know it - he'll be out of office. who will you blame then?

[Teddy B 17,252]

moral relativism may be what you see, but i see someone with an unhealthy fixation that serves no purpose other than to complain. there there, before you know it - he'll be out of office. who will you blame then?

Kinda reminds me of my first wife.

[The Nature Boy 4,224]

The International Brotherhood of Taxi Drivers carry some serious clout.

If they signed up all the Kamikaze drivers in the PI it would

Kinda reminds me of my first wife.

God jesus in heaven I know that chick

[Teddy B 17,252]

God jesus in heaven I know that chick

My ears are still ringing.

[spookyturtle 9,466]

The International Brotherhood of Taxi Drivers carry some serious clout.

Careful, you'll get reported.

[rlogan 2,036]

The problem is the US electorate, not the president.

The electorate is ignorant, cowardly, and full of itself thinking it has the divine authority to rule the rest of the world: American Exceptionalism.

We elect and then re-elect presidents who perpetrate massive war crimes and even brag about how ruthless they are. The politicians call this being "tough on terror". The argument is largely whether Obama has the right military strategy, not whether we should be making war in the first place.

After 9/11 it was much easier to commit the greatest crime this country ever perpetrated upon another country. Anyone objecting like me was treated with the most savage epithets. Terrorist sympathizer. Coward. Stupid. Liar. "Supporting the troops" meant killing them, and if you disagreed, you were killing the troops yourself. There is a little less enthusiasm now but just look: we're actually doing it. We are both providing weapons to, and bombing ISIS.

Until this country gives up on the idea of its divine right to rule, this is going to get worse and eventually end with a coalition that can stop us.

[Curmudgeon 227]

I make specific points and ask direct questions that would be easily answered in a real dialogue, and you answer "Nuh-uh". If you had counterarguments, you'd provide 'em.

As I say, the possibility still exists that he's just the fool: the incredibly inept administrator who not only can't make the right decision, but seems to always reach for the wrong option first: the "anti-Midas" effect. After six years of this though, it's hard to imagine anyone being quite that inept or unlucky, so it's increasingly hard to avoid the knave conclusion. And the media begins to notice: he doesn't give a flip about what the American people want; he's got a pen and he's got a phone and he'll sign whatever diktats he pleases (aka: "dictator").

You don't though. You make hyperbolic claims that are basically sweeping generalizations, such as the president is the worst ever, he deliberately sabotages America and the American people and your proof that this must be the case? How else do we explain the current situation that the US finds itself in?

Take this particular thread, the question is, Is Obama's statement that the US intelligence underestimated the IS threat valid? Your answer seems to be that not only did Obama ignore available evidence of an ever increasing threat from radical islamists but did so BECAUSE he hates America and wants to see it fail. Even if you could prove the former, which is in itself a difficult to prove because assessing levels of threat from terrorist extremists is not an exact science (who knew?) jumping from a failure to act upon available evidence for whatever logical reason might be available you jump to this completely grandiose and untenable statement that Obama is out to sabotage the USA. That's just utter nonsense and you and everyone else knows it.

[rlogan 2,036]

The statement about underestimating the ISIS threat is ludicrous.

It is so vague as to be worse than meaningless. Threat to what? Threat to our puppet government in the green zone of Iraq? Or threat to the President of Syria we are trying to get ISIS to overthrow? Threat to New York City just like Saddam Hussein was? What, exactly?

Obama, in his statements, aims at the Joe six packs he can dupe. Just like Bush. So ISIS is this horrible enemy in these speeches. Even though we are right now arming them in Syria. How can you be giving them weapons to overthrow Syria while at the same time telling us how horrible they are for trying to overthrow Iraq?

Because he figures we are all too stupid to question. All he has to do is deny he's doing that. These are moderate Syrian Islamic Jihadists rebels overthrowing Syria. The important thing is that Obama is "doing something". Staying out of the fight altogether isn't "doing something". That is America standing by while some far corner of the earth is ruled by someone other than us.

[decocker 7,198]

the idea that an american president would say we underestimated intelligence willingly and without an agenda is a naive one.