They were first the rebels we needed to support in Syria.

Then they became a J.V. threat.

Then they were amateur hour.

Now they warrant a prime time address from the White House. The President who once declared the War on Terror over, used variants of the word “terror” eighteen times in his speech. And what of the President’s speech? Put it to you this way — it is the first time he has wanted to talk about jobs and the economy in a long time.

Basically, our strategy is to outsource the military’s job to Syrian rebels. Just last week the President said those rebels are not capable of doing what needs to be done.

Oh, and just yesterday the New York Times reported that

An explosion tore through a secret meeting of one of Syria’s strongest and most enduring rebel groups on Tuesday, killing a dozen of its top leaders, including its head, and striking another blow against the forces seeking to topple President Bashar al-Assad.

Perhaps the President didn’t read the paper yesterday.

But it is more troubling than that.

First, much of ISIS sprang forth from the Syrian rebels. How do we know that the rebels we give weapons to will remain with us?

Second, how do we know they will use our weapons to fight ISIS and not, instead, escalate their civil war with Bassar Al Assad?

Third, how do we know Assad and ISIS won’t strike up a short term strategy to quickly rout the rebels?

Hell, how do we know they won’t eventually turn those weapons on us? The Middle East has a history of that. Perhaps we should call this “Operation Fast & Furious: Syria Edition”.

We have no assurances on any of those questions. All we have is a President who last week said the guys who will fight were not capable and two weeks ago said we had no strategy.

A year ago, on September 10, 2013, President Obama declared basically the same thing about Syria that he said tonight. His speech tonight was an amalgamation of recycled speeches with an economic pep talk at the end. The whole thing was rather schizophrenic at the end.

He said, “It is America that helped remove and destroy Syria’s declared chemical weapons so they cannot pose a threat to the Syrian people – or the world – again.” But that came a day after the New York Times reported “A toxic chemical, probably chlorine, was used as a weapon to attack Syrian villages in April.”

On September 4, 2014, the New York Times reported that Syria “may have hidden chemical arms.” The source was from Barack Obama’s own government.

President Obama has no strategy. He has “just words.” He will arm rebels who may or may not fight on our behalf. He has formed a nine nation coalition, coming after declaring George Bush had “gone it alone” in Iraq with a 37 nation coalition. And now we are just going to trust him apparently.

Folks, this speech is what I imagine you’d try to say to your mom if she walked in on you playing with yourself. It was awkward and we’ve caught the President with his pants down. Now he’s scrambling. But at least we can thank heaven that, according to Barack Obama, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is neither Islamic nor a state.

President Obama’s speech is an admission that he has learned nothing and forgotten nothing in the six years he has been in the White House. We are less safe than we were six years ago because he made bold pronouncements about George Bush’s foreign policy and cannot bring himself to admit how wrong he was.