April 6, 2017

168 Hours of Syria Policy in the Trump Administration

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Let’s roll the tape on the past few days:

Last Friday: Sean Spicer confirms remarks by Secretary of State Tillerson that Trump is OK with leaving Bashar al-Assad in power in Syria. “There is a political reality that we have to accept,” he says.

Tuesday: Trump learns the downside of haphazard policy changes driven mostly by a desire to be different from Obama. Assad, feeling more secure after learning the United States accepts his leadership of Syria, launches a chemical attack on rebels in the town of Khan Sheikhoun.

Wednesday: Trump, apparently shocked to find out that Assad is a butcher, says Assad has “crossed many, many lines.”

Today: Trump tells reporters about Assad, “I guess he’s running things, so something should happen.” Tillerson translates this into English: “It would seem there would be no role for him to govern the Syrian people.”

Later today: We learn that the Pentagon is preparing recommendations for military action in Syria.

A few minutes after that: Regime change is once again official policy. “Those steps are underway” for the US to lead an international effort to remove Assad.

So in the space of a week, we’ve gone from Assad can stay to Assad must go to let’s bomb Syria. This is quite the crack foreign policy team we have in Washington these days.

I can hardly wait for Trump to launch a bombing campaign for a few days—something that’s a routine favorite of US presidents—and then declare it a massive, game-changing retaliation, “something that’s never been done before.” But at least that would be better than something that really was a game changer. Just remember: whatever John McCain recommends, do the opposite.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

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Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

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Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

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