USA Today - 17.10.2019

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OPINION

MIKE THOMPSON/USA TODAY NETWORK

All 12 leading Democratic candidates

for president got a chance to demon-

strate why they were able to meet the

requirements to pack on the stage for

the fourth debate Tuesday.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachu-

setts stayed feisty and focused in her

new role as front-runner.

Former Vice President Joe Biden was

optimistic and self-congratulatory as

he tried to win the John McCain name-

dropping contest. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of

Hawaii confounded everyone by

spreading the blame for the slaughter

of the Kurds in northern Syria that Don-

ald Trump invited to members of “both

parties.” And Andrew Yang got to say

lots of things as if no one had ever

thought of them before.

But the winner of the night was older

than the combined age of the two

youngest candidates on stage — Gab-

bard, 38, and South Bend, Indiana,

Mayor Pete Buttigieg, 37.

Strongest performance yet

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, 78,

returned to the campaign trail after re-

covering from a heart attack to deliver

his strongest debate performance of

the campaign. He was lively, funny and

persuasive. At one point, he even

seemed to convince billionaire Tom

Steyer that billionaires shouldn’t exist.

Sanders also took on Biden’s con-

stant praise of bipartisanship and his

pointed boast, “I’m the only one on this

stage that has gotten anything really

big done.”

“Joe, you talked about working with

Republicans and getting things done,”

Sanders said. “But you know what you

also got done — and I say this as a good

friend — you got the disastrous war in

Iraq done. You got a bankruptcy bill,

which is hurting middle-class families

all over this country. You got trade

agreements like NAFTA and PNTR (per-

manent normal trade relations) with

China done, which have cost us 4 mil-

lion jobs. Now, let’s get to ‘Medicare for

All.’ ... If we stood together, we could

create the greatest health care system

in the world.”

Offstage boost from AOC

But Bernie’s biggest moment of the

night didn’t happen onstage. In the

closing minutes of the debate, news

broke that one of the brightest young

stars on America’s left, Rep. Alexandria

Ocasio-Cortez of New York, will en-

dorse the 2016 Democratic primary

runner-up this weekend.

This gives the democratic socialist

from Vermont the chance to break the

momentum of Warren’s steady rise in

the polls, though he notably hasn’t tak-

en a shot at the Massachusetts senator

on the debate stage yet. Instead, he sid-

ed with her several times as she was

cornered, echoing her arguments for

systemic change.

The format of the debate flowed

much better than the previous three.

It’s unclear whether this was because

the moderators allowed the candidates

more air to answer and rebut each oth-

er, or because self-help guru Marianne

Williamson wasn’t on the stage. What-

ever it is, they should do more of it.

While there are still miles to go be-

fore anyone actually votes for a nomi-

nee, the race for the chance to oppose

Trump will likely remain a tossup

among Sanders, Warren and Biden.

This is mostly because the other candi-

dates have done better at canceling

each other out than breaking through.

Although the debates have led to

some blips in the polls — most notably

for Sen. Kamala Harris of California af-

ter the second debate — the crowded

stage format has the effect of blurring

candidates together, especially since

every debate seems to rehash the same

Medicare for All contentions over and

over until even Sanders seems a little

bored by the fray.

Another huge winner of the night

was impeachment, which is now poll-

ing 50%. Every candidate on stage

backs the inquiry in the House, and no

candidate showed any willingness to

echo the attacks on Hunter Biden that

Trump pressured Ukrainian President

Volodymyr Zelensky into trumping up.

Unfortunately, the biggest loser of

the night was human civilization.

While there was a question about El-

len DeGeneres’ defense of her kindness

to former president and torture pur-

veyor George W. Bush, there wasn’t one

question about climate change. Future

generations will have to be satisfied

knowing that we were much too busy

worrying about rich people getting

along in luxury boxes to stop the planet

from boiling.

Jason Sattler, aka @LOLGOP, is a

member of USA TODAY’s Board of Con-

tributors and host of “The GOTMFV

Show” podcast.

Sanders wins big

on Dem debate night

And only partly due to

what happened onstage

Jason Sattler

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Some of President Donald Trump’s
erratic, impulsive and ill-informed pro-
nouncements turn out to be of little
lasting consequence, like passing gusts
of wind. But his abrupt decision to pull
back U.S. troops serving in northern
Syria was the policy equivalent of pour-
ing gasoline on smoldering embers.
In just 10 days, it has already pro-
duced virtually all of the tragic and dire
consequences that critics predicted:
zBy yielding to Turkish President
Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s invasion
threats on Oct. 6 and withdrawing U.S.
troops from the Syrian border, Trump
surrendered a powerful U.S. self-de-
fense leverage — the ability to call in
devastating air power if even a few
Americans on the ground were threat-
ened. For Erdogan, this was a green
light to move into northern Syria.
zThe American president followed
up by ordering a near total retreat of
U.S. forces from Syria, about 1,
troops. He abandoned — many would
say betrayed — Syrian-Kurdish allies
who had fought alongside Americans in
a successful, years-long campaign to
destroy the Islamic State caliphate.
zThe resulting chaos threatens to
reverse victory against an ISIS network
that inspired mass shootings in Orlan-
do and San Bernardino, and launched
attacks in Europe. Hundreds of ISIS
prisoners have escaped detention
camps, and thousands more operate in
Syrian-based sleeper cells the U.S.-led
coalition had worked to suppress.
zA humanitarian crisis is unfolding.
More than 100,000 civilians have been
displaced by the Turkish invasion.
Hospitals are shuttering. Water is run-
ning short. And Turkish irregular forces
manned by jihadi extremists are engag-
ing in such atrocities as summary exe-
cutions of Kurdish prisoners.
zThe abandoned Kurds have turned
for protection to Syrian President
Bashar Assad — a brutal dictator whose
removal from office has been a goal of
U.S. foreign policy. Assad now can re-
establish control over areas of Syria
that Kurdish-led forces, with America’s
help, had carved out as free, self-gov-
erning zones.
zAssad’s chief sponsor, Russia, will
enjoy expanded influence in the Middle
East. Russian troops are already patrol-
ling areas evacuated by America.
zIran, Syria’s other leading patron
and a key U.S. foe, also wins. The
Trump administration’s goal has been
to constrain Tehran’s aggressive for-
eign policy. But the vacuum created by
Trump’s withdrawal could allow over-

land supply routes for Iranian militia in

Syria and Tehran-supported Hezbollah

fighters threatening Israel.

On Wednesday, Trump defended his

actions in Syria as “strategically bril-

liant.” He said he was acting to end

America’s endless wars.

Actually, the opposite might come to

pass. After lengthy and costly wars in

Afghanistan and Iraq, the Pentagon

had finally developed a cutting-edge

strategy in Syria that employed small

numbers of U.S. special forces in close

coordination with Syrian-Kurdish and

Arab allies to defeat a common enemy

— ISIS in this instance. In the process,

America suffered very few casualties.

That strategy, however, depends

first and foremost on trust, that allies

fighting on the ground know that

America has their backs.

Trump has stripped that trust away

in a matter of days. The next time

America’s homeland is threatened, the

United States might have to do its own

fighting with thousands of its service

membersdeployed overseas to war.

Even some of Trump’s normally syc-

ophantic Republican allies in Congress

have condemned his move, and on

Wednesday the House overwhelmingly

passed a resolution opposing the presi-

dent’s decision to end U.S. operations,

calling on Erdogan to stop military ac-

tion, and expressing continuing sup-

port for the Kurds.

Vice President Mike Pence and Sec-

retary of State Mike Pompeo have been

dispatched to Turkey to tamp down the

flames sparked by Trump’s ineptitude.

All the fire extinguishers in the world

might not be enough to do that.

TODAY'S DEBATE: THE MIDDLE EAST

Our view: Trump plays with

matches, and Syria burns

Ras al-Ain, Syria, on Wednesday.

NAZEER AL-KHATIB/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

President Donald Trump cam-
paigned on a very specific foreign pol-
icy. “America First” has its roots in the
less-interventionist policies of our
Founding Fathers.
Then-candidate Trump said often
that the Iraq War was a mistake, and
that we were in too many places for too
long. Fast-forward to 2019, and
the president is now moving for-
ward to stop the “endless wars.” I
stand with him.
The idea that our president
would make this decision from
this perspective is refreshing
and long-awaited. Virtually ev-
ery president in my lifetime has
ended up in a new conflict or extending
and expanding the old ones.
In particular, in the past 18 years,
from Iraq to Libya to Syria, past presi-
dents went into one bad misadventure
after another.
The Syrian civil war was a mess from
the beginning, with Sen. Lindsey Gra-
ham, R-S.C., and then-Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton supporting arms
that went to Sunni extremists, which
allowed the war to go on long enough
that hundreds of thousands died and
millions were displaced.
During every conflict, as we attempt
to extricate ourselves, there is always a

chorus of hawks who scream about

what will happen when we leave. It

usually happens if we stay anyway.

Iraq. Afghanistan. Now Syria. We

hear that our presence could be needed

for decades. To what end? What do we

hope happens during that time? I, for

one, don’t see what our national inter-

est is in policing the Middle East and

nation-building. Thankfully, neither

does President Trump.

His bold action to remove our

troops from Syria is the contin-

uation of his policy to leave that

civil war. He sought to defeat

the Islamic State and did. What

is left is a decades-long battle

among Turks, Kurds and Syri-

ans that we cannot solve.

Every decision has a price. Would

you be willing to send your son or

daughter to stand between two armies

7,000 miles away as a human shield? I

would not.

For those who want to stay, come to

Congress as you should. Tell us, for

starters, whom you would declare war

on. Our NATO ally Turkey? The Kurds?

Syria? No one can answer this because

there is no clear U.S. interest and no

need for our troops. That’s President

Trump’s standard, and I support it.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., serves on the

Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Opposing view:No clear-cut

U.S. interest, no need for troops

Rand Paul

AP

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., left, and

former Vice President Joe Biden on

Tuesday in Westerville, Ohio.

JOHN MINCHILLO/AP