State Department: Iran Leading Sponsor of Terror

Only a few short months after releasing billions of dollars in frozen funds for the benefit of Iran, the Obama administration admitted this week that the rogue state remained the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism. A new annual report from the State Department named Iran, Sudan, and Syria as official state sponsors of global terror, noting that the Islamic Republic was by far the worst.

Iran “remained the foremost state sponsor of terrorism in 2015, providing a range of support, including financial, training, and equipment to groups around the world,” said the report. It went on to identify Iran’s aid to Hezbollah and Shia groups in Iraq as specifics.

If we can agree that there is no reasonable distinction between supporting terrorism and actually participating in said terrorism, then it’s obvious that Obama no longer holds the belief that the U.S. does not negotiate with terrorists. Because that’s exactly what we did with Iran. And they did not have to make a single concession as it pertained to their support of groups like Hezbollah. The U.S. basically said, “Yeah, you guys go ahead and keep doing that. That’s fine. We’ll talk about that some other day. In the meantime, how would you like billions of dollars?”

We can debate whether or not the nuclear agreement will actually prevent Iran from developing the bomb. The American people (including Congress) has been kept mostly in the dark about the details of the deal. One partisan says this, one partisan says that. We don’t know.

What we do know is that the United States, under President Obama, has abandoned the principle of “peace through strength” that has kept World War III from becoming reality. This is the ultimate example of what Donald Trump means when he says the world is laughing at us. But it’s one thing for our allies to laugh smugly about how they got one over on the big, bad United States; it’s quite another for our enemies to chortle about a once-powerful lion having been turned into a meek sheep.

This isn’t about us puffing out our chests and claiming ownership over the world. This is about building on the legacy left to us by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, and the thousands of soldiers who paid the ultimate price to preserve and protect the greatest idea that man ever brought to life. Under Obama, the beautiful light of American hope has been covered by the darkness of ignorance and conceit.

What does it mean, they ask, to make America great again? And it’s really simple: we let that light shine.