JOHN DICKERSON: Senator Sanders, you said you wanna rid the planet of ISIS. In the previous debate you said the greatest threat to national security was climate change. Do you still believe that?Okay, let's look at that in slow motion. Stand by your former statement boldly and clearly"
BERNIE SANDERS: Absolutely. In fact, climate change is directly related to the growth of terrorism. And if we do not get our act together and listen to what the scientists say you're gonna see countries all over the world-- this is what the C.I.A. says, they're gonna be struggling over limited amounts of water, limited amounts of land to grow their crops. And you're gonna see all kinds of international conflict. But of course international terrorism is a major issue that we've got to address today. And I agree with much of what-- the secretary and-- and the governor have said. Only have one area of-- of disagreement with the secretary. I think she said something like, "The bulk of the responsibility is not ours." Well, in fact, I would argue that the disastrous invasion of Iraq, something that I strongly opposed, has unraveled the region completely. And led to the rise of Al Qaeda-- and to-- ISIS. Now, in fact, what we have got to do-- and I think there is widespread agreement here-- 'cause the United States cannot do it alone. What we need to do is lead an international coalition which includes-- very significantly-- (UNINTEL) nations in that region are gonna have to fight and defend their way of life.
Absolutely.Open an escape path:
In fact, climate change is directly related to the growth of terrorism.The former statement, which now sounds wrong, is that X is the most important thing, but now people have reason to feel, very urgently, that Y is the most important thing. Create a springboard for yourself. Invite the audience to think that X and Y are really the same thing. That's tantalizing. They're looking to see this fascinating connection, so begin to create the feeling that X and Y are connected:
And if we do not get our act together and listen to what the scientists say you're gonna see countries all over the world-- this is what the C.I.A. says, they're gonna be struggling over limited amounts of water, limited amounts of land to grow their crops. And you're gonna see all kinds of international conflict.Climate change isn't just about what the climate does but how people react to it, and there will be struggle and conflict, and that at least vaguely reminds us of the bloodshed associated with ISIS, but ISIS isn't fighting over the temperature. You can't get to that escape path, climate change is directly related to the growth of terrorism.
So just act as though you've already arrived where you've said you'd go, and who cares if X or Y is more important? You've said X is important, so plunge right ahead and say Y is important:
But of course international terrorism is a major issue that we've got to address today.And then collapse into drivel. You agree with Clinton and you don't agree. What was the part that you disagreed with, that "The bulk of the responsibility is not ours"?
Well, in fact, I would argue that the disastrous invasion of Iraq, something that I strongly opposed, has unraveled the region completely.So you think bulk of the responsibility is ours?!
And led to the rise of Al Qaeda-- and to-- ISIS.The invasion of Iraq led to the rise of al Qaeda?! You're faltering badly, but you know there are magic words — 2 words that if only you can just get to them you've done your trick. Come on, Bernie:
Now, in fact, what we have got to do-- and I think there is widespread agreement here-- 'cause the United States cannot do it alone. What we need to do is lead an international coalition...APPLAUSE!!!!
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45 comments:
What do you say when you're on camera, miked, and conscious while falling 1,600 words in a botched analogy stunt?
I am Laslo.
We have yet to experience any of the dire events the alarmists suggest we will have. And yet, ISIS is killing people in Paris. So, how closely related are they, really? If the world stayed exactly as it is now, Isis is alive and well. What are you going to do about it?
Some event thst may happen in the future may increase terrorism or lawlessness, but it's a hypothetical at the moment.
We have terrorism NOW. And it doesn't require global warming.
Someone sharpened her pen a couple days ago, skewering David Brooks, and now Bernie. And I love it.
"Well, in fact, I would argue that the disastrous invasion of Iraq, something that I strongly opposed, has unraveled the region completely. So you think bulk of the responsibility is ours?!
And led to the rise of Al Qaeda-- and to-- ISIS. The invasion of Iraq led to the rise of al Qaeda?! "
what led to ISIS was us withdrawing from Iraq. We had contained it, there was little violence. And if we had troops in the area and they tried to invade we would kill them while they were still "the JV team".
They are only this strong because no ne was there to oppose them. Who was there? we were.
We had the troops in place to deal with this threat. France is paying for our negligence.
And the idea that the invasion was to blame is false.
We may need to invade again, to deal with ISIS. If we defeat ISIS militarily and then withdraw again, another group may come forward because we withdrew too quickly. That is not the fault of the invasion but the fault of the withdrawal.
And it was al Qaeda that decided to attack us in Iraq. If that's where they want to have the battle, then so be it.
"Well, in fact, I would argue that the disastrous invasion of Iraq, something that I strongly opposed, has unraveled the region completely."
This is what the Left said about SE Asia after the US, at the urging of Sanders and his comrades, abandoned our allies in the region in 1975. Unlike everywhere else in the world, in SE Asia communism would not have led to mass murder if the US had stayed out of it.
That's the way it is with these '60s radical. It's always 1968.
Fargin' idiot.
He's a deer in the headlights of oncoming senility.
Senator Sanders' three-phase foreign policy plan:
1. Stop Climate Change
2. ?
3. Peace
Sanders speaks for the Democrat base. Campus rape and global warming are much more important than a bunch of rag heads in another country.
The way to deal with both rape and terrorism is to hide under the covers, or even under the bed itself.
Those incidents of workplace violence that keep happening here can be dealt with by gun control.
I wonder what the rag heads are planning for here ?
10,000 or 100,000 Syrians should be enough to tell us eventually.
I wonder how Bernie finds his way to his car. Or maybe he doesn't drive, because Global Warming and oil companies?
I hope Althouse is currently unpacking Hillary's explanation that because she helped rebuild Wall Street after 9/11, she can now take massive donations from them, even though they are eeeeevil. Or something.
She gets shrill with that explanation. Everyone backs off when she gets shrill, but that's where a good prosecutor would start to drill down. Cats fluff up and hiss, dogs growl, show their teeth, and get that ridge of fur rising along their spines, a puffer fish does this, and all of these behaviors are to scare away a threat.
Hillary gets shrill. That is her tell. That is when the thumbscrews should come out. Then, after drilling down and getting to the real story, the prosecutor should beef up his personal security detail. Which might be why people back off when Hillary gets shrill.
Michael K -
Found at Bare Naked Islam. Pictures of real refugees, and Syrian "refugees".
In fact, climate change is directly related to the growth of terrorism.
Is the media treating this idiotic statement as disqualifying?
I read the entire politico article reporting he lost the debate and they didn't even mention it.
"10,000 or 100,000 Syrians should be enough to tell us eventually"
If they were consistent, Prog politicians would oppose taking in refugees or illegal aliens, since by adopting our wasteful way of life they are bound to worsen global warming.
It is nice to think that even Prog politicians should be judged on their logic end evidence, their probity and coherence. I like a good fisking as much as anyone, but it is also beside the point. For Bernie et al., it's all about signals and dog whistles. Sequence or connection or basis in fact make no difference. Or they do, selectively, insofar as they can be used by "fact checkers" against GOPers.
Sanders knows he's supposed to try to get votes from AMERICANS, doesn't he?
Seems to me that most Americans would be pissed/incredulous to hear someone who wants to be their president suggest that the West deserves terrorist attacks.
How deluded with oikophobia do you have to be to hear that and agree?
First thing, the climate change theory is not science. Calling it science is an appeal to authority. In my view, it is a prediction about future events based upon corrupt data and a faulty model and it has been dead wrong for at least 20 years. Not exactly Newtonian physics, is it? And who benefits in an economy without coal, oil and natural gas (if that was even possible)? Rich coastal elites, Green big business and the government. What, for example, is gained under Obama's Clean Power Plan? Per the EPA, the planet avoids an 0.018 C degree increase in temperature by 2100; long after we are all dead.
Call climate change for what it is: a scam. It is a scam because the government has to spend other people's money to save the earth at some future unknown date not disclosed at the time the money is paid. In a scam, the players never give a date for the event; it is either indefinite or so far in the future that the results will never be measured by the people who are being scammed.
Less experienced con artists frequently make the mistake of setting a deadline. From time to time we have seen examples of people posing as preachers setting a date certain for the Second Coming. When the date passes, the suckers are mocked by the media. Smarter con artists like Al Gore and Bill McKibben set the end of the world as 2100; well after their contributors' checks have cleared.
We known that Green regulations are a multi-billion dollar drag on the economy now. Imagine what 300% higher energy costs like Germany has today would do to the US economy.
The key to understanding Hillary's push for solar panels on every house is that the new solar companies will destroy large segments of the economy; the coal and natural gas utilities along with railroads. Winners and losers are picked by DC. To build a new Green economy, the Street will have to raise billions in capital. The solar and wind industries are currently subsidized by the tax code and have a whole lot of income runway to cover in a Clinton Administration. Clinton's call for a renewable energy economy is solely a method to shift income to her friends while she pockets a nice rent check for her trouble. Saving the Earth is the last thing on Hillary's mind.
Since Ann thoroughly dissects the logical nuttiness of all this, I will confine myself to a side issue. This from Bernie:
"they're gonna be struggling over limited amounts of water, limited amounts of land to grow their crops."
I wonder if anyone in the once proudly pro-Israel Democratic Party (which now reviles Israel) have ever read anything about Israel's incredible efforts to develop desalinization and conserve water to the extent that they now produce all the water they need and more. If the idiotic anti-Semitism of the Middle East were to abate, the entire region could provide the water it needs as well by working with the Israelis to adopt their already existing technology. As to limited amounts of land, apparently Bernie is ignorant of the fact that the world is already producing MORE food on LESS land than in the past - and that one factor actually INCREASING the land's fertility is more CO2 in the air. No less a science "denier" than the world's foremost physicist Freeman Dyson has a great forward to a study showing that this increase in vegetation and land fertility is the SINGLE biggest effect of increasing CO2 levels:
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2015/10/benefits-of-co2.pdf
I wonder when the Democrats will address these realities with any honesty at all.
Thanks for the fisking, Professor. Now we just sit back and wait for the MSM to eviscerate the drooling old fool like they have with the doctor and the pyramids. And then hopefully they'll turn their sights on Sanders, too.
"I wonder when the Democrats will address these realities with any honesty at all."
I predict not until the year 2100.
The problem isn't Bernie Sanders. He's a socialist joke.
The problem is that 40-50% of the Democrat party buys into his nonsense.
They really believe that climate change is a mortal threat and that buying a Prius will heroically help to stop this.
They really don't believe that Radical Muslims are a threat to Western Civilization, and that enacting lax immigration and large welfare policies in Europe (and to some degree in the US) enables these enemies.
The materialism is too great, especially when combined with the presumed knowledge of history and its endlessly predictable end: We're killing the 'environment'...the water wars are coming...'capitalism' is collapsing...there are too many people....there are too many people who don't believe in the same ideas as us...colonialism has plundered the world, we must save or understand and convert them....
In other words: We're all going to die because (S)cience tells us so, but only (S)cience and electing 'democratic socialists' like me to power can save us...I have this knowledge, and you can too, and then you can 'see' the world as it really is...I speak for 'The People' blah blah blah.
A dog's breakfast of bad ideas, many truth and knowledge claims, failed ideology, true-believers, doomsayers and collective cultists, really.
At least get some nice kicks and a bunk bed if you join the commune.
Super Fraud is doubling down on the Global Warming Big Lie.
Science Is being used as Fraud by the evil Dems.
Otherwise expect more activism, more radicalism driving social change, its logic trumpeted in virtue-signalling competitions when expedient, conveniently ignored when not expedient, Expect less economic activity, more laws, more regulations, more taxes, and the same ol' panderin' politicians following the incentives in place, trying to divine 'the geneeral will.'
Climate change is real. The climate change crisis is not. It is parts manipulation, hysteria and misinformation.
ISIS terrorism is also real. Unlike climate change it will not last forever, and unlike climate change we can do something about it.
Attacking ISIS where they live will not end the terrorism. The terrorist wave that triggered WW I in Sarajevo had gone on for 40 plus years. But the anarchists did not have an army looking to take over a bunch of countries.
Don't expect Obama to do much. He will leave it to others. Perhaps the Germans can remilitarize and help out. Think how useful that would be,
If the idiotic anti-Semitism of the Middle East were to abate, the entire region could provide the water it needs as well by working with the Israelis to adopt their already existing technology.
Just think if idiot Jerry Brown would adopt the Israeli technology the drought in California would not be a problem. I have lived through at least three droughts this severe and there were lots of desalination plants working during the last one in 1977. They were all dismantled after it ended and there is only one I know of in San Diego. The money to be spent on the bullet train to nowhere would build 100 such plants here. I can only conclude that Democrats prefer issues to solving them.
One of the reasons the Germans, and Europe in general, remain(s) reluctant in militarizing, is that the EU is a project made to turn away from one of the bloodiest centuries, really....ever.
It's bureaucratic, bloodless...has huge and perhaps fatal design flaws, remains a top-down political/economic union with a lot of bad incentives, sure...but the Germans themselves have made anything too overtly nationalistic and military taboo...and they surely get a lot (perhaps too much) shit from everyone else about it.
Their good habits and economy is driving much of it.
Like the U.S. and like most every other country, Germany finds itself facing competitive global challenges and labor markets, the rise of many other people who think differently...a rising tide of migrants.
and of course, militant fanatics and terrorists potentially at war with them.
Their history, character, and location leads them to their own loyalties and interests.
The Muslim world is turning back to Islam, and radical Islam too, and rejecting most of modernity, and is still a roiling pot of ancient tribal, ethnic, and autocratic loyalties breeding this kind of terrorism.
So....how much military and whose military? Under what leadership and through what channels? How much diplomacy and shared intel?
How much legitimacy does anyone need to kill ISIS, and who has the authority (if anyone) to grant and institutionalizes any sort of legitimacy?
All throughout European (and American) cities are Muslim migrant enclaves where this kind of radicalization can take place.
All it takes is one, or a few. Low probability, but high consequences of an attack.
Many moral commitments (many absolute) often cause Muslims to reason from very different principles, and feel passionate about very different loyalties than ours, and a few of them are able to be radicalized, often from these commitments.
In the meantime, the Middle-East is a mess, and we've gone from a few generations of being a pretty strong horse in the neighborhood, to almost not being there at all.
This has led to the rise of what many in the Muslim world are building in the chaos right now, and it can easily become a direct security threat.
Such groups have been one of the major security threats for over a generation.
The Bern needs to weaponize his age disability the way Hillary has her vagina against hostile questioners. "You'd hit a lil old man? How dare you!"
International coalition? I'll get the bribes and coercion ready!
Liberals (commenters over at Salon for instance) blame all the problems in the Middle East on our involvement in those countries, our supporting dictators, and our own business interests there. Liberals also blame the US for causing all the problems in the Middle East on our invasion of Iraq to remove that dictator. Liberals refuse to blame any of the problems in the Middle East on the people and culture in the Middle East. Even when Muslims kill each other, it's not their fault. It's our fault because we don't care enough (about brown people). That pretty much summarizes the Left at this point. It's really hard to be a Democrat anymore.
I don't want to be "ageist" or anything (hard to do when you had your 72nd birthday a couple of weeks ago). But my hobby (flying antique model airplanes) puts me around a number of men and women who are as much as 20 years older than myself. I have noticed one thing which may explain Bernie Sanders drivel.
Some, but not all, 80 year olds tend to dribble and drool on themselves. You can spot what they had for lunch by reading their shirt front. I think Bernie has slipped over to the drool squad--mentally at least if not physically.
But the argument that global warming has caused an increase in terrorism has some logical problems. I don't see that any Afghan for example has to worry much about a rise in sea levels. If the seashore ever gets to Afghanistan, a whole lot of us are going to be underwater. A good deal of the third world relies on subsistence farming to survive. I don't see widespread stories in the press about crop failures in third world countries. I'm sure that they do exist (if you know about farming you know that crops can fail, or a sudden hailstorm--for example--can wipe out a season's if not a year's work).
But I don't read about climate change caused crop failures in third world countries. If Bernie could just point out a few such real world occurrences, I might be inclined to take the old coot more seriously. For now he's just a joke with intellectual mustard stains all over his shirt.
Trad Guy wrote:
"Science Is being used as Fraud by the evil Dems."
People who use the word 'science' after the word 'social' are already committing fraud.
-Science is designed to remove mind from the data collection process.
-By definition, mind cannot be removed from anything that is social.
Superb postmortem analysis of Bernie's nonsense.
The invasion of Iraq led to the rise of al Qaeda?!
He meant al Qaeda in Iraq which became ISIS. There actually had been a small corner of Iraq in the ortheast, near the Kurdish area, that Saddam Hussein had let al Qaeda rule. They moved into the vacuum
Now that happened, because other countries, especially Syria, but also probably Saudi Arabia, and Iran, did not want the onvasion of Iraq to be a success because that would be a bad precedent and because Bush and Rumsfeld did not understand that the opposition did not consist only of "bitter enders" who could only get weaker and weaker with time.
You can't get to that escape path, climate change is directly related to the growth of terrorism.
There's a tricky way to do that, actually:
Climate change [read carbon dioxide] caused a drought in Syria, starting in late 2006. Are droughts ever caused by anything else? The drought, which lasted three years, caused many many people in Syria to migrate to the cities. Now we'll pretend that the protests that happened in 2011 were because of Syrian government policies related in some way to the drought. The protests were harshly put down, which caused a revolt, which then provided an opportuniy for al Qaeda in Iraq. (especially because Assad's strategy was to leave a major terrorist enemy of the United states as his sole surviving enemy.)
Oh - and by the way, ignore all that about the drought and people moving into the cities - just say climate changed caused all that.
Re: limited amounts of water, land.
Remember, this is all high abstraction. Yes, it's true of course, Israel has shown the way hwo to get along without too much naturally occurring fresh water, and there is no shortage of land.
But, at a high level of abstraction, maybe you can tie conflict to shortage of natural resources. At least that gives you a peaceful way to avoid conflict. If you throw in a couple of more assumptions, at any rate.
Here's the Scientific American article I linked elsewhere:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-change-hastened-the-syrian-war/
This did not come out of Bernie Sanders' head. Obama and the Defense Department and the CIA and the State Department maybe has been saying the same thing:
See:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/immediate-risk-to-national-security-posed-by-global-warming/
And of course, ex-President Clinton, has been saying the same thing. Bill Clinton is famous for saying for years that the most serious national security problem from China is China burning carbon dioxide, (he gets paid a lot of money to say so, probably) although maybe he personally maybe did not say climate change causes wars. I can't find a link quickly.
See also:
http://www.pri.org/stories/2015-10-14/what-americas-greatest-national-security-threat
Hillary Clinton chose nuclear proliferation. Some nonsese is for other Democrats to say.
We had chased al Qaeda out of Iraq, but by taht time they had a sanctuary in Syria.
Dunno..I don't think ascribing Berno's idiocy to age is truthful or helpful. His biggest fans appear to be vibrant young idiots...who themselves often resort to ageism when they fail to defend their positions. The ideology of free stuff is trans-birthdate.
But I do think he may be slipping. He should have been able to contort this more directly back to his fixation on the 1%/income inequality etc somehow.
Oh..I guess he's in Paris only in his mind:
James Taylor thinks of Paris.
No less a science "denier" than the world's foremost physicist Freeman Dyson
I wish his good buddy, Richard Feynman, were here to shame those climate "scientists" into pursuing a new profession. He wouldn't put up with such shoddy work.
So, basically all we need to do is wreck the world's economy, and both terrorism and climate change will go away. Or to look at it another way: the terrorists want to destroy civilized society; let's do it for them. Then they won't have anything to do.
But they will, of course. Lording it over a feudal de-industrialized society is what they long for. They would have to compete with the leftists who have pretty much the same vision.
Funny, isn't it.
Israel is just a few miles away from Syria, yet Global Warming hasn't set the Israelis on a mad dash to escape to Europe.
I'm sure there's a lesson in that, but I'm too dumb to see it.
Meade's comment reminded me of Communism/Marxism.
1. Establish the Dictatorship of the proletariat
2. Steal everyone's property
3. ????
4. The state withers away and Utopia.
In response to Senator Sanders, see:
1. Saddam: What We Now Know (link) by Jim Lacey* draws from the Iraq Survey Group (re WMD) and Iraqi Perspectives Project (re terrorism). * Dr. Lacey was a researcher and author for the Iraqi Perspectives Project (link).
2. Explanation (link) of the law and policy, fact basis for Operation Iraqi Freedom.
3. UN Recognizes 'Major Changes' In Iraq (link) by VP Joe Biden on behalf of the UN Security Council.
4. Withdrawal Symptoms: The Bungling of the Iraq Exit (link) by OIF senior advisor Rick Brennan.
5. How Obama Abandoned Democracy in Iraq (link) by OIF official and senior advisor Emma Sky.
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