Alfonse D'Amato

On ISIS, the president doesn’t have a winning strategy

Posted

Last week in San Bernardino, Calif., Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik senselessly shot and killed 14 people and injured 17 more.

Farook was an environmental specialist, born in the U.S., who worked for the San Bernardino County health department for five years. He was also a terrorist in the making. According to multiple reports, he was becoming radicalized, and had been in touch with international terrorist outlets. Malik, his wife, had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, or ISIS.

In a rare address from the Oval Office on Sunday night, President Obama set out to quell America’s fears and uneasiness about worldwide terrorism. People are afraid to travel, afraid to go to the malls to shop or to take mass transportation. Look at what happened in San Bernardino — these people were just celebrating the holidays!

The president is a deer caught in the headlights, with no idea of how to handle ISIS. According to a CNN poll released Sunday, 60 percent of Americans disapprove of Obama’s handling of terrorism, and two-thirds disapprove of his handling of ISIS. The poll was conducted before the San Bernardino shootings, and showed that the president needs to do something, fast.

Much of the dissatisfaction comes from the lack of any real strategy to destroy ISIS.

Last January, Obama claimed that ISIS was the “junior varsity.” Just hours before the attack in Paris last month, he stated that the organization was “not gaining strength.” Before the Thanksgiving weekend, he warned jittery Americans to “be careful.”

We are faced with radical Islamic terrorism right now. We live in very dangerous times, and if we are going to truly put an end to ISIS, we have to do more then simply tell people, “Be afraid!”

It was good to hear the president having some reaction to Islamic terrorism (although he won’t call it that), but his address lacked substance. In a response, Sen. Marco Rubio said, “The strategy that’s brought us to this point is the strategy he’s going to continue with.”

Page 1 / 3