Allies in Congress and former aides from inside the Obama administration worry the president has misread Americans’ fears of a repeat of what happened in Paris on American soil. Today, he met with President Obama at the White House; he met with British prime minister David Cameron yesterday, and will meet with German chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday.
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The majority who think a terror attack is likely includes 28 percent of Americans who now say an attack is “very likely;” that figure is the highest it’s been since February 2003 (35 percent), when the USA was on high terror alert just before the start of the US invasion of Iraq.
The President of the United States even explained what ISIS’ plans are.
Despite the recent situation in the French capital, President Obama is upbeat about the conference.
“We do not succumb to fear”, Obama said during a news conference closing out the final leg of his nine-day, three nation trip overseas. While Obama sneers at critics of his plan to process Syrian refugees normally as being fearful of widows and orphans, only 15% think revamping security in this process is not necessary.
“How we report on this has to maintain perspective and not empower in any way these terrorist organizations or elevate them in ways that make it easier for them to recruit or make them stronger”, he argued.
Here & Now’s Indira Lakshmanan talks to Brett McGurk, Special Presidential Envoy to theGlobal Coalition to Counter ISIL, about the challenges of fighting ISIS and how the attacks in Paris and Beirut and the downing of the Russian plane over Egypt are affecting the USA and coalition strategy.
“I’ve &ellipsis; welcomed Moscow going after ISIL”, Obama told CEOs in Manila, using one of several acronyms used to identify the Islamic State.Obama said USA officials have seen a change in Russia’s tone since it announced that ISIS had bombed the Metrojet airliner that crashed in Egypt in October. Still, he noted “the problem has been in their initial military incursion into Syria, they have been more focused on propping up President Assad”. Perhaps they will blame the ISIS attacks on a TV show. “We’re strengthened by people from every religion, including Muslim Americans”.
President Obama said the USA will continue to lead the global coalition to roll back ISIL in Iraq and Syria to “take out more of their leaders and commanders so they will not be able to threaten us”.
“They’re a bunch of killers with good social media”.
Speaking in Manila last week, President Obama ridiculed Republicans for objecting to his plan to bring 10,000 Syrian refugees to the USA this year.
He said, “I’m not afraid that ISIL would beat us due to their operations”.
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ISIS is not the jayvee team, as claimed by President Obama. “The United States could never be at any war with any religion because America is made up by multiple religions”.
