concern when the President to be inaugurated does not believe intelligence about an American adversary
I dislike Trump for many reasons but, based on the track
record of the US intelligence community over the course of the last 10-15 years, if he approaches the intelligence briefings that are fed to him with the same skepticism that he has displayed for climate science, I can only see that as a positive.
Do we want him to brush off the next "Bin Laden determined to strike US" intelligence reports? Let's not forget that the Iraq WMD fiasco was due in large part to Bush being fixated on hitting Iraq even before 9/11 happened and putting his thumb on the whole intelligence process. Obama on the other hand has demonstrated no such predispositions toward confronting Russia and was even criticized by the GOP earlier in his presidency for being too friendly toward them (the US already tried a "reset" with Russia not too long ago).
if he approaches the intelligence briefings that are fed to him with the same skepticism that he has displayed for climate science, I can only see that as a positive.
A skeptic would at least concede the possibility that there is some truth to climate science, despite the political machinations around it, and actually consider the evidence on its own terms. Trump appears to believe the entire thing is a Chinese conspiracy to harm American business. That's not skepticism, it's just denial.
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I dislike Trump for many reasons but, based on the track record of the US intelligence community over the course of the last 10-15 years, if he approaches the intelligence briefings that are fed to him with the same skepticism that he has displayed for climate science, I can only see that as a positive.
Do we want him to brush off the next "Bin Laden determined to strike US" intelligence reports? Let's not forget that the Iraq WMD fiasco was due in large part to Bush being fixated on hitting Iraq even before 9/11 happened and putting his thumb on the whole intelligence process. Obama on the other hand has demonstrated no such predispositions toward confronting Russia and was even criticized by the GOP earlier in his presidency for being too friendly toward them (the US already tried a "reset" with Russia not too long ago).
A skeptic would at least concede the possibility that there is some truth to climate science, despite the political machinations around it, and actually consider the evidence on its own terms. Trump appears to believe the entire thing is a Chinese conspiracy to harm American business. That's not skepticism, it's just denial.