Former Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) had nothing but contempt for the new reports of President Donald Trump's memorandum of understanding to end the Iran war he started — noting on MS NOW's "Deadline: White House" Monday that he is leaving the United States and its allies in a considerably worse position than they were before, and even Republicans aren't rushing to celebrate it.
"So we're not even going to have a conversation about the nuclear program until we've removed all of our leverage points," noted anchor Nicolle Wallace. "What, if anything, is America getting?"
"Not much," said McCaskill bluntly.
First of all, she noted, "the only thing that Donald Trump has done here is kind of solve a problem he caused," since he was the one who escalated hostilities against Iran in the first place, and "now they're trying to pretend that he's putting out a fire that he didn't start."
Additionally, McCaskill continued, even Trump loyalists like Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) are reserving judgment for the time being. "The fact that Lindsey is expressing doubts tells you all you need to know about how, really, well, I was going to use a bad word here. This deal is it's really bad. It's not a deal."
The biggest insult of all, she continued, is to the military.
"At one point in time, we had military leadership that was strong enough to advise presidents in a meaningful way," said McCaskill. "We were seen as almost invincible in the world because of the strength of our military and its leadership. This administration is ruining the credibility of our military around the world. They are making us less safe by what they have done, because now there's a whole lot of folks out there that go, wait a minute, they can't manage a military the size of Iran?"
"No wonder Xi and Putin are high-fiving," McCaskill lamented, adding that these two rival leaders "can't believe" Trump sidetracked American power so badly at moments when they have their own ambitions. "This is nutty foreign policy. It makes us weak. It makes it dangerous for America. And it does permanent damage to our standing in the world and the standing of our military."