Beware the JV team

Wow, for such a pitiful terrorist organization ISIL, ISIS, IS. sure grew up in a hurry.  "Like nothing ever seen".  Sneaking across the border and planning to "pivot to a 9/11 attack", maybe "blowing up a US city".   Wow.  Does anyone else think they've gone from underestimating these guys to overestimating them in a few weeks?

Not that we shouldn't acknowledge them, but it should be accurately.  Brutal acts of terror towards Americans tend to produce reactions, but they tend to trigger ass-covering political kneejerks.  These are the things Obama has referred to as "acting stupidly" and has hinted that the actual Obama Doctrine might be summed up as "don't do stupid stuff".

But real stupidity is making a Twitter hashtag saying "bring back our girls".  Or underestimating groups like ISIS in the first place.  Everyone should know, especially the leader of the free world, about the brutality of violent Islamic Jihadism by now.  Obama said they don't belong in the 21st Century, hell they didn't belong in the 15th Century. It shouldn't take a beheading to wake people up.

But the narrative is now changing.  The JV team are now flesh-eating monsters that must be confronted to save our cities, at least somehow--maybe via Iraq forces or someone in the region, if the moon is right, but not with US combat boots on the ground, only Special Forces and advisor boots are allowed, or pilot boots in the cockpit, and by the way, the hostages were almost rescued.  Depending on which branch of government is speaking.    

At least that's the political spin.  The emotional spin is a little different, understandably:

Their brother was beheaded by terrorists. Now, the siblings of American journalist James Foley say more could have been done to save him from ISIS, and they hope more will be done to save another American hostage, Steven Sotloff.

"Even take the money aside, there's more that could have been done directly on Jim's behalf, and I really hope in respect to Steven, they do something quickly," Michael Foley told Yahoo! News. "There is things that can be done, we're sitting on prisoners for example in Guantanamo, it doesn't even have to be financial," he said.

Bold added to indicate what happens when precedents are set by America negotiating with terrorists. And to use an Obama phrase let's be clear here--the axiom was always "America does not negotiate with terrorists, period".  Not this kind of asterisked BS..

.."(we) do not provide ransom or any funding for terrorist organizations."

In other words, negotiation is OK.  And there was apparently some negotiation with ISIS.  As with recent AQ-affiliates, the IS 'folks' wanted Aafia Siddiqui, wife of 9/11 terrorist Ammar Baluchi.  Evidently that was a bridge too far, something the families of the victims--and future victims--will not understand.

Meanwhile they gave a White House briefing today in Martha's Vineyard and some of the media came. Deputy spokesman Eric Schultz probably wishes they had all stayed at the pool.  He was grilled by both ABC and CNN reporters on the optics of Obama giving his response to a head-chopping then zipping off to the first tee for high fives and laughs minutes later. Imagine Bush doing that. But an interesting thing occurred--the spokesman, in trying to defend the optics, released a bit of flop sweat...

On a final related note, the decision of the GAO that Obama's decision to transfer five Taliban terrorists for Sergeant Bergdahl was against the law was broached by the Fox News reporter, who wondered if the White House agreed (they don't) and whether they plan to act on the decision. The answer was seemingly no. In other words, Obama is the final arbiter of such things and has decided he was within his rights to break the law or something.  

The Fox guy wondered about actual consequences (hehe), to which Schultz referred him to the GAO (as if they dole out punishment). OK, in a worse case scenario somebody (or somebodys) at the Pentagon may get a suspension for violating the Anti-Deficiency Act (ie, spending money that wasn't lawfully appropriated) but nothing will happen at the top level folks--they will simply say they don't agree with the decision if asked.  And nothing will happen because the MSM won't pursue it.  And Eric Holder is a black man.  

It's unnecessary to point out how that kind of precedent might affect the rule of law going forward. At least it should be.

BLAST FROM THE PAST  8/22/14

Here's NY Times talking about Syria back in 2007:

Syria is encouraging Sunni Arab insurgent groups and former Iraqi Baathists with ties to the leaders of Saddam Hussein’s government to organize here, diplomats and Syrian political analysts say. By building strong ties to those groups, they say, Syria hopes to gain influence in Iraq before what it sees as the inevitable waning of the American presence there.

...“The American project in Iraq is collapsing, and we decided it was important to reach out to fellow Iraqis now,” said Nizar Samari, the spokesman for the conference and a former media director for Mr. Hussein.

What a tangled web. But hey, Assad is still in power.