President Trump suggested that a former president had told him he wished that he’d bombed Iran.
“Look, for 47 years, no president was willing to do what I’m doing,” Trump said. “And they should have done it a long time ago. It would have been a lot easier. There’s no president that wanted to do it. And yet every president knew.”
Trump continued, “I’ve spoken to a certain president, who I like, actually — a past president — former president. He said, ‘I wish I did it. I wish I did.’ But they didn’t do it. I’m doing it.”
When asked “which president?” Trump answered, “I can’t tell you that. It would be very bad for his career, even though he’s got no career left.”
Trump appeared to hint later that it was Bill Clinton. The media rushed to former presidents and got strange non-denial denials.
Trump says a former president had an Iran confession. Aides to his predecessors deny recent contact – Washington Post
Spot the ‘weasel word’ there. “Recent.” There’s no reason for this to be a purely recent conversation.
Representatives for each of former Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Joe Biden said they had not spoken with Trump recently. The individuals spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to discuss the former presidents’ private conversations.
So we have a complete non-denial denial in which there’s off-the-record denials about ‘recent conversations’ even though this could have been a conversation from years ago. That’s followed by a second-tier non-denial denial.
Journalist Sam Stein posted to X, “Clinton camp on Trump saying he’s spoken to an ex-president who applauded his war in Iran: ‘They haven’t talked about Iran.’”
Okay. Since this is the Clintons we should probably ask about the definition of “talked” and “Iran”.
Realistically speaking, Trump’s follow comments pretty much ruled out Bush and Republicans. Jimmy Carter is the last guy I imagine telling Trump that he wishes he’d bombed Iran, but this could have been a conversation back in the 80’s or 90’s and who knows what kind of lust for bombing Iran Jimmuh might have kept locked up in his grimy little heart when he wasn’t pandering to the Pakistani bankers and terrorists who funded him.
Also, Trump seems to imply this particular president is alive which narrows it down to Obama and Bill Clinton. And I have trouble buying that as coming from Obama. Could Bill Clinton have said it? On Iran (like pretty much everything else), Bill Clinton talked out of both sides of his mouth, both in office and out of office. He wanted to cut a deal with Iran, but he also backed Israel’s Project Merlin to keep the Israelis from taking out Iran’s nukes. When his wife was running, he talked tough on Iran, but not when Bush contemplated action on Iran.
This entire discussion though circles right back to what Trump was really pointing out, which is that every president (even Obama) used the “all options are on the table” rhetoric about preventing Iran from getting a nuke. They just didn’t follow through. He did.
