President Donald Trump was pounded Wednesday over a ham-handed defense of his Iran war escalation that left MS NOW host Stephanie Ruhle sickened.
After pointing out that Trump had just threatened on Truth Social to commit war crimes by bombing critical civilian infrastructure, Ruhle had her producers put up a graphic from a presidential post in which he wrote:
“Afghanistan War: 20 years, 2,000 DEAD.
Iraq War: 9 years, 4,600 DEAD.
Vietnam War: 19 years and 5 months, 58,220 DEAD.
Korean War: 3 years and 1 month, 36,574 DEAD.
Venezuela War: 1 day, 0 DEAD.
Iran Military Conflict: 4 months, 18 DEAD."
That led the MS NOW host to blurt, “Yesterday he posted [this] as his defense for the war. He was comparing the death toll in Iran to other wars. You have it right there on your screen: Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam, Korea, Venezuela. Iran military conflict, four months, 18 dead.”
“He's basically saying only 18 [dead], we should take that as a win,” the incredulous Ruhle added.
“Is this going to be a winning argument for this president? It's only been 18, we’re good?” she asked former New York Times reporter Luke Broadwater.
“I mean, that was a kind of a shocking post to me to put up,” Broadwater began as Ruhle interrupted with, “Even for him, shocking.”
“Yeah,” Broadwater agreed. “On the day before he's going to the dignified transfer of dead American troops who are coming back into this country,”
“You know, if you're the families of some of those troops and you see him minimizing their deaths like that, I think that that strikes the wrong note for those families,” he added. “But to your question at large, the American people have never supported this war. The polling for it has never been positive.”
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