I’ve never had much of an opinion of American UN ambassadors since possibly Jeanne Kirpatrick and Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Even the best have been too eager to appease the Third World failed states and terrorist sanctuaries that constitute a majority of the UN membership. Nikki Haley has proven to be a true warrior and a shining star in an organization that has been accelerating towards buffoonery for years.

Today she was on This Week with Martha Raddatz (I swear, she’s been embalmed and reanimated by some method only known to H. P. Lovecraft). The first part of the interview is bizarre with Raddatz hazing Haley over the Russia probe and finally asserting that all the facts are known:

RADDATZ: What do you think should happen to Russia for hacking into the U.S. election, for trying to influence the U.S. election?

HALEY: I think that, you know, first of all the facts need to come out, that whole process needs to take place. And if there were some —

RADDATZ: But what facts haven’t come out? Seventeen U.S. intelligence agencies said that they did that. Do you believe them?

This is not even what the intelligence community has said. In fact, absolutely no sane person has claimed Russia tried “hacking into the U.S. election.”

Apparently the media has suddenly discovered there is a war in Syria and that Assad is a bad hombre.

RADDATZ: Let’s talk about Syria a little more.

You and Secretary Tillerson, secretary of State, have said that Assad leaving power is no longer a priority.

So let me return to your comments about human rights and your charge that Assad has committed war crimes.

Do we just let that go?

HALEY: So Assad is always a priority. That is not an issue. He is a war crime. He has done terrible things to his own people. He has used chemical weapons on his own people. He continues to be a hindrance to peace in Syria. And that is something the administration strongly believes.

But in addition to that, we need to start putting pressure on Russia and Iran in terms of the fact we need to get Iran out of there. We need to get the Iranian influence out of there. We need to…

RADDATZ: But if Assad…

(CROSSTALK)

RADDATZ: — can stay in power. Assad can stay in power?

That’s not a…

HALEY: If we can…

RADDATZ: — priority?

HALEY: No, our goal is we want to bring Assad to justice. We want them to pay for the crimes that he’s done. We’re going to continue to let Russia know how dangerous it is to keep Assad in power.

In addition to that, we’re going to fight ISIS. We’re going to try and bring stability back to the area. You don’t have to have one or the other. We’ve got a lot of important issues. Assad is not going away, but we’re not going to stop beating up on him. We’re not going to stop saying that the way he treats the people in Syria is wrong, that he has actually killed his own people and America will never stand for that.

RADDATZ: That sounds like talk, Ambassador Haley. That sounds like talk, not walk.

(watch the whole clip, someone has done a great job of giving Haley media training)

2012 – "Red line"
2013 – ???
2014 – ???
2015 – ???
2016 – ???
20017 – "What are you doing about Assad, Nikki Haley?"

— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) April 2, 2017

Were Raddatz not so pathetic and elderly one would be excused for laughing at her. This may very well be the first time US action toward Assad has been the subject on a Sunday show since Obama’s last “red line” war dance. But Obama’s douchebaggery was noted by a lot of people on the left:

Speaking to the BBC on Sunday, President Barack Obama took a firm, unbending, and principled stand against something not a soul has advocated: that the United States and its allies use ground forces to oust Bashar al-Assad. “It would,” pronounced the president, “be a mistake for the United States, or Great Britain, or a combination of Western states to send in ground troops and overthrow the Assad regime.” Vanquished once again, this time for the benefit of British viewers, was the customary invade-and-occupy straw man.
…
Rather than instructing his secretary of defense to give him options to complicate the deadly work of Mr. Assad and mitigate its worst effects, the president consistently rebukes arguments no one makes. No doubt he banks on public indifference and ignorance. No doubt he counts on people nodding sagely when he says Syria is complicated and that it would not be a great idea to invade the place. He must know this is base trickery. Is this simply a matter of trying to fill and kill time between now and January 20, 2017?

Now the media is about to rediscover the plight of Syrians in Syria and they are about to suddenly recall that this is the guy who used chemical weapons on his own people and nothing happened. Don’t say I didn’t tell you so.