Out-Bluffed

John McCain is very generous.   Tuesday, President Trump threatened

North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States. They will be met with fire and fury lie the world has never seen. He has been very threatening beyond a normal statement as as I said, they will be met with fire and fury and, frankly, power the likes of which this world has never seen before. Thank you.







Arizona senator realizes Donald Trump is the person least familiar with intense psychiatric care to know anything about "normal."  And so 

“The great leaders I’ve seen don’t threaten unless they’re ready to act and I’m not sure President Trump is ready to act,” he said.

McCain said he did not know if Trump’s threat was serious and may have just been showmanship.

“It’s not terrible in what he said,” the senator said. “It’s the classic Trump in that he overstates things.”

Overstating things might describe the words of a Christmas-and-Easter churchgoer who claims to be "very religious" or "faith-based."  It is quite another thing to threaten to respond to an unprovoked attack with a nuclear attack which would kill more than the roughly quarter of a million people whose death was caused by the atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

And unprovoked it would be, if the President's words are to be believed- which, admittedly, they shouldn't be because it's Donald Trump.  Generously, McCain did not address Trump's words as warning Pyongyang not to act rashly but not to "make any more threats."  Mere words, according to the President, would be  sufficient.  A bit later

North Korea said Wednesday it was considering using intermediate-range ballistic missiles near Guam, the U.S. territory that is home to strategic military installations, dramatically raising tensions with the United States.

The country’s military said it was “carefully examining the operational plan for making an enveloping fire at the areas around Guam with medium-to-long-range strategic ballistic rocket Hwasong-12,” according to a statement carried by the the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). The news agency reported that Kim Jong Un was reviewing the plan. Yonhap, the South Korean news agency, reported that a separate North Korean statement vowed an all-out war if the U.S. launched a “preventive war” against the North.

The threat came hours after President Trump vowed to respond with “fire and fury” if North Korea threatens the United States, comments that were made in apparent response to a Defense Intelligence Agency assessment that North Korea might already possess a miniaturized nuclear warhead that it could place inside an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching the U.S.

Before Kim's threat to Guam, South Carolina's Lindsey Graham had stated "President Trump has basically drawn a red line saying that he’ll never allow North Korea to have an ICBM missile that can hit America, with a nuclear weapon on top. He’s not going to contain the threat. He’s going to stop the threat."  He should have stuck with McCain's script.

The President's spokesperson later today will deny it, but Kim Jong Un has crossed that red line. He has called Donald Trump's bluff.  Fortunately, being a con man rather than a crazy man, all talk, no action Donald will back down and the nation will for the time being be spared another war.

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