Obama Says He Was Surprised By ISIS, Despite Being Warned By President Bush

In January 2014 President Obama referred to ISIS, one of the most vicious terror armies to ever exist, of being a "JV team."

“The analogy we use around here sometimes,and I think is accurate, is if a JV team puts on Lakers uniforms, that doesn’t make them Kobe Bryant,” Obama told the New Yorker at the time.

After that comment the group marched from Syria to Iraq, taking large swaths of territory, pillaging and raping along the way and slaughtering thousands. 

Now with just a month left in his presidency, President Obama is saying he was surprised by the capability of ISIS to control major parts of the region, becoming a world wide threat. 

"The ability of ISIL to not just mass inside of Syria, but then to initiate major land offensives that took Mosul, for example, that was not on my intelligence radar screen," Obama told CNN's Fareed Zakaria in an interview airing Wednesday night. 

There was no reason for Obama or those in his administration to be surprised, after all, they were warned about the consequences of rapidly leaving Iraq and did it anyway.

Obama knew a group like ISIS had potential, but ignored warnings for political and ideological reasons. The consequences for that decision have been deadly.