Author Leigh McGowan and National Review Senior writer Noah Rothman (YouTube Screengrab)
Author Leigh McGowan had no patience with National Review Senior writer Noah Rothman's characterization of President Donald Trump as a Middle East savior defusing an Iranian nuclear threat.
The spat began on the Thursday night episode of CNN Newsnight with Abby Phillip, with Rothman claiming “the Iran threat was metastasizing” and that presidents preceding Trump “did nothing about it.”
“So yeah, all of that did happen over the course of several administrations that did nothing about it. … and that got us to here,” Rotman told the panel.
At that point cross-talk erupted between Rothman and McGowan, the author of “A Return to Common Sense” over the effectiveness of the Obama Iran nuclear accords, which Trump jettisoned when he took the White House.
“Can you actually let me speak for one frickin' second, bro,” McGowan finally demanded over the bickering.
“There was a deal and Trump came in and said, ‘I can get a better deal.’ And he ripped it up and he didn't get a better deal,” said McGowan. “And then he went into that country at the request of another country's leader [Israel], and he spent $50 billion and killed thousands of civilians and at least 13 American soldiers and hundreds of American soldiers are injured. We've hurt our bases. We've hurt our radar [capabilities]. People there hate America now.”
“We also had a president say that ‘we're going to destroy an entire civilization,’” McGowan continued, her voice rising. “That's like, if I came home and I held a gun to my wife's head and I said -- for 13 hours -- that ‘I'm going to kill you. I'm going to blow your brains out.' and then '... just kidding. We'll talk about it again in two weeks.’”
“That does not make you a good negotiator,” McGowan practically howled. “That doesn't make you a good guy. It makes you psychotic. And he's the leader of the free world. And everyone knows that now. So, no, this is not some winning strategy that Trump came in after years of being begged to help with Iran. This is not what's happening.”