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Jeb: Obama 'completely lost' on ISIS
11/24/2015   By Mark Hensch | The Hill
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Former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-Fla.) said Tuesday that President Obama lacks a vision for defeating the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
“This president seems lost, completely lost, with this,” he said on “New Hampshire Today” during its broadcast on WGIR AM 610 in Manchester, N.H.

“Our lack of leadership is now creating chaos all over the world that we’re going to have to pay a heavy price for over the long haul,” Bush told host Jack Heath.

“Unlike the president, I believe that American leadership is essential,” the 2016 GOP presidential candidate added.

“It requires listening to the commanders and creating a strategy. This president doesn’t have one.”

Bush said U.S. diplomacy is essential for creating the effort for ultimately vanquishing ISIS.

“It starts with American leadership,” he said. "Without American leadership, there is no coalition that can be built.

“There is no unity. The Arab world won’t join, and Europe certainly won’t.”

The former Florida governor said restrictions placed on the American military are hobbling the American air campaign now being waged against ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

“We need to take the lawyers off the backs of our war fighters so that our sorties can be successful,” he said. "We need air controllers to identify where the strikes should hit."

Obama’s plan for eliminating ISIS is under fierce scrutiny following a string of brutal terrorist attacks worldwide.

ISIS is believed to have coordinated bombings and shootings across Paris earlier this month that killed 130 people and wounded more than 300 others.

The group also took credit for bombing a Russian jet over Egypt late last month that killed 224 people over the Sinai Peninsula.

Obama is now escalating his push for greater international cooperation against the jihadist group.

“It is a scourge that threatens all of us,” Obama said of ISIS during a White House press conference Tuesday.

“And, that’s why, for more than a year, the United States, France and our coalition of some 60 nations have been united in our one mission: to defeat these ISIL terrorists and defeat their vile ideology,” he added, using an alternative acronym for the terrorist organization.

French President François Hollande visited the White House Tuesday in hopes of getting fresh help against ISIS overseas.

Hollande is now pressing for greater cooperation between the U.S. and Russia despite their past differences on counterterrorism.

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