Cruz: Obama-Clinton foreign policy to blame for rise of ISIS

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) on Wednesday offered a scathing critique of President Obama for what he called “fundamentally unserious” remarks outlining the president’s plan to tackle the growing terrorist threat in the Middle East.

{mosads}Cruz also placed the blame for the growth of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria on both President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s shoulders, a nod to the prospect of both Cruz and Clinton running for president in 2016, as most observers expect.

“I thought the remarks tonight continued the president’s approach to this crisis, which is that they were fundamentally unserious,” Cruz said on Fox News.

He said Obama offered “a defense of the failed Obama-Clinton foreign policy,” which amounts to “a defense of leading from behind and has led to most of the world being on fire.”

“What we didn’t see tonight was a commander in chief focused on U.S. national security, who stood up and said there are radical Islamic terrorists who have declared war on the United States … and we will respond with overwhelming air force to take them out,” Cruz added.

“Instead, he suggested targeted attacks and focused frankly on political issues that are peripheral from the central question of how we protect America from those who would take jihad to our nation.”

Cruz continued to criticize the “Obama-Clinton foreign policy” because, he said, the two Democrats “are intertwined.”

“She was his secretary of State. She was in charge of implementing the strategy of, quote ‘leading from behind,’ which featured the United States effectively withdrawing from leadership in the world, and it created a vacuum into which these players have stepped.”

The senator also decried the Obama-Clinton policy as “photo-op foreign policy.”

“And so, there have been some air attacks, there has been a missile here, a bomb there. What has been missing is a concrete military objective to eliminate ISIS, to take them out, because they have become qualitatively more dangerous,” as they have grown stronger economically, he said.

But Cruz argued that the president should seek congressional approval before launching a military campaign, because it would force Obama to clarify his goals and approach to the threat.

“You want a demonstration of presidential hubris, look no further than this speech tonight,” Cruz said.