Granted, the United States has contributed to a lot of messes around the globe, but we’re pretty certain Syria was a humanitarian nightmare well before the U.S. dipped a toe in the waters.

President Obama, of course, famously drew that red line in Syria, although the New York Times later described his warning as an “off-the-cuff” remark that surprised even close advisers and put the United States in a bind. Just this month, former Secretary of State John Kerry declared that President Obama “never retreated from his red line,” just months after telling a group of Syrian civilians that it was he himself who had pushed for military intervention but “lost the argument.”

And then there was Kerry’s predecessor, who, during the debates, threw her former boss under the bus, claiming that Syria was “a disaster” but that all she could do was provide recommendations to the president.

That’s not to say the United States did nothing. Samantha Power did have that one family of refugees over to the penthouse for a spaghetti dinner one night.

He was obviously responding to President Trump’s plan for a temporary block on Syrian refugees, but like his fellow Democrats above, Sen. Chris Murphy put the blame for the disaster in Syria on the U.S.

Syria was a horror movie well before the U.S. finally bought tickets to watch the nightmare play out from the back row. And when America did see what was going on there, there was public support for an intervention that, in retrospect, both Clinton and Kerry claimed they were pushing for but couldn’t make happen.

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Yeah, those #UnitedForUkraine hashtags written in Sharpie were a pretty aggressive message to Putin, but it had to be done.

So, if there hasn’t been an effective foreign policy in place for the last eight years, what’s the plan?

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Tags: Chris MurphyDonald Trumpforeign policynightmarerefugeesSyria