Report Pokes More Holes In Dubious Claim Soleimani Was Plotting ‘Imminent’ Attack | Talking Points Memo

A lengthy new report pokes yet more holes in the Trump administration’s already-dubious claims that it needed to kill a top Iranian general in order to prevent an “imminent” threat.


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1284032

Giuliani’s three “words”:

A noun, a verb, and 9-11

Pompeo’s three words:

“We don’t know…”

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From the reporting (I’m assuming too few people can access it). This act which no one is cheering but in fact are protesting on the streets will not help a president who’s never had 50% approval rating (currently 41.8 according to fivethirtyeight.com) which is what it takes to be reelected.

The episode briefly gave Mr. Trump’s allies something to cheer, distracting from the coming Senate impeachment trial, but now he faces questions even among Republicans about the shifting justifications for the strike that he and his national security team have offered. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo initially cited the need to forestall an “imminent” attack and the president has amplified that to say four American embassies were targeted.

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Not my circus, not my monkeys!

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The tide’s shifting, Donnie…

More please…

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It appears Soleimani was Pompeo’s white whale -a guy he’s wanted for many years and finally was able to get by convincing an ignorant President it was the way to go.

Along with Pompeo, Pence and Haspel were on board; none of whom I trust, although Haspel did correct predict Iran’s (initial) response.

Soleimani was obviously a bad guy, but nowhere in that deep dive of an article is there any mention of anyone thinking about secondary and tertiary consequences that would inevitably arise.

I’ll give the American people credit here. The majority have a great unease about what occurred here and don’t trust Trump at all in regards to conducting any possible war.

This Administration, when it thinks at all, only thinks in the short-term. But it’s the longer term consequences that should keep us awake. It’s not as if the Middle East needed any more instability.

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Using the administration’s logic, I can say that Trump’s actions have caused harm and death. I don’t know precisely where or when the next calamity will be, but there will be more if he’s not stopped.

Since a drone strike is NOT an option, get out and vote

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At the rate Donnie’s digging, any bets on when he hits the core of the earth?

trump%20grave

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No imminent threat. Reports he did it to bolster certain Senator’s support with his Impeachment.

If the Senate doesn’t convict on one of the first two articles of Impeachment, I think this is an obvious third.

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Yes, but all that is old news so we should really stop talking about it and focus on something else.

(not really, but I’m sure that’ll be getting rolled out soon)

I know, how about we look at the ~180 people killed by Iran’s totally predictable over-caution thanks to Trump trying to boost his poll numbers?

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So we are told. Haspel forte is not prediction but enhanced interrogation techniques.

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I’m beginning to think that the Trump administration isn’t always completely truthful. Has anyone else noticed that?

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If it was imminent when did they notify the embassies to evacuate? Why didn’t any local news organizations cover any of the four evacuations? Could it be Trump is lying? A week after the fact, today’s explanation makes no sense.

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Fake thinking…

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Hate to be that guy, but the reader doesn’t learn the “lengthy report” is from NYT until the 7th graph. Source is key. Don’t bury it.

ETA: Some of us don’t always follow the links and expect full report in the text.

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I’ve noticed that since I was at his Inauguration by my lonesome…unless you count a couple hundred Russians that also just happened to be around.

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In typical Trump fashion, he hyped up the base. Now the truth comes out in dribs and drabs while he runs around changing his story with each gust of wind between his ears. Lets keep our eyes on the prize. Don’t let his attempts to change the subject send us into a tail spin. We stay focused and we win.

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The attacks were imminent except they weren’t. No timely notification of Congress or the Gang of Eight due to time constraints and other nefarious excuses. Except his buddies at Mar-a-Lago knew something was up (Eric Trump tweeted about it) and Lindsey Graham said he was in the loop, Trump said the Baghdad embassy was one of the targets and there were four total embassies under threat. Except, the embassies had not been given the warning wrt what Trump told Laura Ingraham.

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Not my fruitcake, not my nuts.

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Can you imagine how much more despised Pompeo is by those in his department? Leave aside the utterly unjustified assassination of Soleimani, but Pompeo’s nonsense explanations show how weak and rattled he is by this ‘mistake’.

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