Joe Kent Flip Flops: How Iran Exposed the Wokeness of the Anti-Trump Right
Many on the Isolationist Right are revealing themselves as, well, Leftists—not against war but against power of any kind and the idea that the U.S. has the right to wield it in our own defense.
A week ago, Joe Kent, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, resigned his post; he could not, he wrote, in good conscience support the war in Iran. “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” wrote Kent, posting a public letter to President Trump on his Twitter account exploring the theme.
According to Kent, President Trump had been duped by “high-ranking Israeli officials and influential members of the American media” who “deployed a misinformation campaign that wholly undermined your America First platform and sowed pro-war sentiments to encourage a war with Iran,” wrote Kent. Trump had been “deceived,” played for a patsy, puppeteered by the Israelis into evildoing, as so many before him! (Israel was behind the ISIS attack that killed his wife in Syria in 2019, Kent wrote.) The powerless, hapless, blind Trump had been pulled along against his will. “I pray that you will reflect upon what we are doing in Iran, and who we are doing it for,” wrote Kent, who then went on an anti-Israel podcast tour—Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, Breaking Points, et al.
None of what he wrote is true, of course. Trump has been talking up the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran for decades. It wasn’t only the Israelis who wanted him to neuter Iran’s ballistic and nuclear capabilities but the Saudis, who urged the President to take action. Now, Qatar and the UAE have added their voices, urging the President to finish the job. Israel was not behind the creation of ISIS, nor the invasion of Iraq. And President Trump was not duped into anything. He is the most powerful executive the United States has had n recent memory.
Apparently, this last point is something even Joe Kent is now willing to acknowledge. Today, amid news that the President had halted our assault on Iran because negotiations are going well to reach a deal, Kent begged the President to use his immense agency and power to reign in those evil Israelis! They will oppose a deal with Iran, Kent promised, but the President, the powerful, the mighty, the wise and the strong and wonderful President of the United States, he alone can make them see the truth and force them to behave!
”President Trump is working to get peace with Iran, if he can make this happen it will be a very good thing for our nation & our allies in the Gulf,” wrote Kent. “The Israelis will be against this, but POTUS is strong & can get them on board.”
What a difference a week makes!
Which is it? Is the President a weak man dragged along and duped by scheming, war-mongering Jews—or is he the only leader strong and clear-eyed enough to get a nuclear deal with the Iranians and force the Israelis to set aside their nefarious ways?
Like all cowards who wish to oppose something the President is doing without blaming him, it’s both, for Joe Kent: The President is the powerless dupe of the Israelis when he’s operating against the will of the anti-Israel isolationists, and he is the great noble hero when he is doing what Kent and friends would prefer.
These people aren’t against war, as they claim; they are against the use of power to protect American lives and interests. And in this sense, they are like all other Leftists in the 21st century. They are against the President when he is using our military power to defend us from the possibility of a nuclear Iran, and then once again for the President when he is prepared to use negotiations for that same goal—though of course, as has been proven time and time again and as anyone who isn’t a Leftist can clearly see, negotiations only work with the Islamic Regime of Iran when you have the real threat of force behind you.
This hatred of power, the view of agency and strength as inherently evil when wielded by Western forces, are the most salient hallmarks of wokeness. It’s why the Left hates Israel, why anti-Zionism is a gateway drug to Leftism for people like Kent and Tucker Carlson and a host of others: If you oppose power and strength as inherently evil, you will hate Israel because it is backed by the U.S. and it is stronger than its enemies.
But it’s not just Israel. This is an inherently anti-American worldview, because for the Leftists who feel this way, there is nothing about America that is worthy of being defended through the use of force, nothing that makes the U.S. uniquely worthy of the great strength we are able to project—which thereby justifies that use of force.
This was the worldview underwriting a wild clip from an interview Tucker Carlson did with The Economist this weekend, in which he seemed to suggest that America should start sharing power with China.
“The U.S. is not going to defend and cannot defend Taiwan,” Carlson told The Economist’s editor in chief Zanny Minton Beddoes. “I think we’ve reached the limits of our power, and power has limits. Like, that’s another thing just to keep in mind: Power is not infinite. You can squander it and we’re in the process of doing that.”
Carlson went on: “In the end, big powers want to and get to control their regions. We have something called the Monroe Doctrine. This is another problem I had with Russia. It’s like Russia of course is going to demand influence in Ukraine. And you could say, ‘Oh, it’s a sovereign country. They can’t have any influence there.’ Be real. A big power wants to control hopefully in a non-brutal, enlightened way, but they want some influence over their neighbors. We can no longer be the sole author of terms—of commerce, of anything. We have to share power.”
“With China?”
“Of course, because of their scale. And so there’s got to be a non-destructive way to do this.”
At first blush, this looks like self-contradictory gobbledygook. Power is not infinite, so it must be shared—with countries like Russia, which understandably don’t want to share power with their neighbor Ukraine. Because Russia is strong, therefore, it has a right to use force against Ukraine—and that’s why America must share power with China, because we cannot expect to have limitless power and influence.
What?
The logic Carlson appears to be using is that big powers want power, which is why the United States must share it—and why Russia and China get to have it.
That makes absolutely no sense, until you realize what Carlson is actually saying: He is saying our power specifically must be shared. Our power specifically should not be infinite.
This isn’t a deep insight about power or a logical principle you can apply universally; it’s just your average Leftist orthodoxy: America is morally compromised and therefore should be weakened and our adversaries, who are good by virtue of opposing us from a position of weakness, must be made stronger. It’s the belief that a multi-polar universe is necessary to reign in the evils of American empire.
This is exactly what the Leftist Larpers who went on safari in Cuba this weekend think, yet somehow Carlson thinks he has successfully passed it off as “America First.”
Of course, for people not in thrall to leftist thinking, this is obviously nonsense. America First means not only that we put our interests above all else—certainly above the Chinese Communist Party’s desires for power—but that we think we have the right to, because there is something worth protecting here, something exceptional. That doesn’t mean we export that or force it on others or sacrifice precious lives to giving it away. But it does mean that we don’t believe in artificially limiting our own ability to defend ourselves because we have randomly “reached the limits of our power” or some nonsense.
Freed of the woke mind virus, it’s obvious that when President Trump says he’s protecting our grandkids from having to face off against a nuclear armed Islamic Regime, he isn’t being hypnotized by sneaky, scheming Jews. He is insisting on our right not to be afraid of standing up for ourselves, our right to believe that this nation and its values are worth defending and protecting.
People not afflicted with wokeness can easily see how the moderate Muslim Gulf states united with Israel and urged President Trump on. The IRGC bet on the Arab Street—a real miscalculation, as Zineb Riboua points out. Turns out, our allies in the region—not just Israel but Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, Bahrain—all want the President to finish the job and denude Iran of the ability to use ballistic or nuclear weapons against its neighbors.
Please God, that’s what the negotiations will yield in the week to come.
"He is insisting on our right not to be afraid of standing up for ourselves, our right to believe that this nation and its values are worth defending and protecting."
Thank you for saying this simple truth. Iran has committed hundreds of offenses, including killing over a thousand Americans, in the past 47 years. Putting Israel aside, Iran should have been dealt with long ago. Thankfully, Trump has the fortitude to do it.
You forgot to include the PA who according to this morning’s C&C are siding with the Saudi’s against Iran. Funny how rats don’t have much loyalty. They want the 17 billion dollars dangled by the Board of Peace.