Former Texas Governor Rick Perry (R) said that State Department was “out of touch with reality” on Thursday’s “Kelly File” on the Fox News Channel.
Regarding the debate over the terminology used to describe terrorism and John Kerry’s declaration that we were in the “least violent” period in world history, Perry said, “well, the words notwithstanding, reminds me a lot of another Secretary of State [who] said ‘what difference does it make?’ And I think you’ve got an administration that is headed up at the Secretary of State’s office, for sure, with some folks that are a little bit out of touch with reality. And, you know, go tell the families of those 20-plus Coptic Christians that, you know, this has been a really nice safe year. Go tell the people in the malls across the country that were afraid to go because of the threat of ISIS. We know, and Americans know, that this is a real threat, and this administration needs to address it and address it straight up, and give us a plan, tell us how are you going to deal with this? How are you going to make us safe? And give us an optimistic view about what the future of the world is and what the future of this country is, and we haven’t heard it out of this administration, that’s for sure” he stated.
Perry continued, “we need to send a very clear message to not just the world, but certainly to this group. This is the face of evil, and we need a coalition effort with the Jordanians, with the Saudis, with our NAT allies that, clearly is going to go out and extinguish this threat. And we need to have — obviously it’s going to take boots on the ground. It’s going to require both those Jordanians, Saudis, other coalition troops, along with US forces to go in, to identify and to eliminate this threat. Nothing less than that is going to be acceptable.”
Perry concluded, “well certainly, I think you’ve got to have a clear threat to the individuals who are involved with this. I mean, the idea that somehow or another we’re going to be nice enough to these people, we’re going to give them enough opportunities, falls pretty flat. So, the military aspect of this is going to be extremely important. Obviously, human intelligence and being able to identify these individuals, where they are and affect them is very much a part of that as well. But, you know, if the only thing they understand is the threat of power, then that’s what we’re going to have to express to them. But, I think it starts at the top, and I think the President of the Snited States calling this for what it is, and that is radical Islam. And when the King of Jordan, when the King of Saudi Arabia both call it what it is, and our president refuses to do that, that’s a real problem. We’ve got to call this what it is, it’s radical Islam, and it’s got to be eliminated.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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