I must confess that I watched the most recent CNN debate among the United States Republican presidential hopefuls and must admit that, as is the feature of such spectacles, it has generated more heat than light.

Perhaps the best moment for me was one which may have escaped the attention of most of those watching this political reality show. It involved Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey, who promised that should he become president of the United States, he would assure King Hussein of Jordan that America will support him in the fight against Islamic terrorism.

Well, Governor Christie certainly had me wondering about his methods of getting in touch with the Jordanian ruler, since King Hussein has been dead now for some 15 years.

Anyone, including a presidential hopeful, can be pardoned for not being aware of the passing of a significant player on the world stage. However, one who berates the current occupant of the Oval Office for his failure to have a coherent strategy to deal definitively with the prevailing crisis in the Middle East should, at least, know who is the current leader of Jordan.

What was also quite interesting is that Donald Trump, who aspires to be commander-in-chief of the most advanced armed forces in the world, is totally oblivious of what has long been known as the nuclear triad — a central feature of American military strategy.

This again is coming from a man who is most disparaging of what he sees to be the ignorance and incompetence of the current president. As an onlooker to this sordid political spectacle one can be forgiven for wanting a Hillary Clinton coronation instead of an election.

It is so sad when one hears the critiques of Barack Obama’s efforts to quell the fears of his fellow citizens from those who are trying to give voters a false sense of hope that Americans will be safe if only they elect one of them. The fact is that intelligence experts are in agreement that an act like the one in California might be difficult, if not impossible, to thwart given the simplicity of its execution, particularly in an environment in which guns are so readily available.

Selling Americans the false hope of absolute security from terrorist designs is either a sign of stupidity or an act of fraud. America and the world certainly deserve better than this.

The simplistic analysis of the ISIS phenomenon is worthy of contempt. Navigating the web of intrigue, which defines the nexus of colliding allegiances and interests in what is now a global crisis, is a feat not worthy of the intellectually feeble.

For starters, the Iranians and ISIS are mortal enemies.The Kurds — on whom the Americans are most reliant in providing the bulk of the ground force against ISIS — are the sworn enemies of US ally Turkey. Iran, an ally of Bahsar Al-Assad, the Syrian president, is close with the Iraqi regime — a supposed friend of the US — and this is in no way a complete picture of this entanglement.

Yet there are those who are selling the yarn that getting rid of ISIS is simply a matter of using the highly indiscriminate and outdated practice of carpet bombing. One of the most powerful recruiting tools for ISIS is to engage America in an apocalyptic battle. By not sending in American ground troops the president is trying to deprive ISIS of this propaganda boon. His strategy is to destroy the ISIS caliphate without committing American forces to the ground war that ISIS wants. It would seem a reasonable though not bombastic approach.

cpamckenzie @gmail.com