Boy, seems a lot of people had trouble with Tillerson’s hearing which I just don't get. Many seem to agree with Rubio’s attack - I think it was idiotic - can’t believe how many people think it a good idea to start the new administration off by attacking Putin this way - don’t get me wrong, I don’t much doubt that Putin is a war criminal - he’s not Stalinesque in his enthusiasm for mowing people down, but he’s cut from the same mold - but I also believe there’s nothing to be gained and much to lose in dwelling on it - Obama’s idiocy has empowered Putin, that’s the unfortunate place you start from, ignoring that reality gets you nowhere - I’m sure FDR understood that Stalin was an awful person [Churchill certainly did] but it didn't take a brilliant stroke of genius to figure out there was nothing to be gained by dwelling on the fact.
Some seem to be troubled by Tillerson’s apparent willingness to accept the status quo, as it has developed, in Syria - ie, Iran and Russia are embedded, Assad is going to stay, let’s focus on ISIS. The whole point of getting involved in Syria early and robustly was that the longer you waited, the worse your options were going to become until you’d essentially be left with no good options - once Obama walked away from the redline, empowered Russia, appeased Iran in order to get his awful nuke deal, what we have now was gonna be the inevitable result, and the mess is so well developed, the garden so overrun with weeds, that you simply cannot save the garden, certainly not in any straightforward way. So pick your spot - ISIS - I mean, with Al Qaeda taking over the Syrian opposition, do you really think now is a good time to worry about Assad? Go after ISIS, embrace the Kurds - this will piss off Turkey, but the time has come to push back against Erdogan - it will push him closer to Russia but I think I can live with that because my real target is Iran - Iran is the key. [although Putin and Turkey’s ability to manipulate the refugee crisis and destabilize Europe is certainly problematic]
Still others are worried that his past business dealings will compromise his judgment - nothing illegitimate about this concern, but if such a problem develops, it will become obvious, and he won't be long for the job. To me there are many crossover skills between being a globe trotting big time CEO and being Secretary of State - the content and agenda you're dealing with are obviously different, but the management skills remain the same. It may be a trite and ridiculous analogy to make, but, what the hell, I’ll make it anyway: the guy who was really good at running a steak house is probably gonna be really good at running a vegan cafe - the content is different, the required management skills remain pretty much the same. QED.
Then there was some amazement that Tillerson hadn’t discussed in detail what the new administration's Russia policy is gonna look like - this doesn’t surprise me at all - Trump is still Trump, nothing has changed since getting elected - he’s a salesman, a marketer, a communicator, maybe a deal maker - he’s most decidedly not a policy wonk. Going into detail about policy is not something he’s going to do. Is that a problem? Quite possibly - which is why I’m still a firm agnostic when it comes to the Trump presidency - could go well, could simply be ‘interesting’, could be a complete disaster - there’s no way to know at this point what to realistically expect - but, he starts off his presidency by moving the embassy to Jerusalem, which I’m [possibly with foolishness] kinda hoping he does - well, it’s gonna get real real, real fast.
