Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Because today is indeed a day of national mourning, I'm going to postpone addressing President Obama's speech of last night other than to say it horrifies me to know that this man is our nation's Commander-In-Chief and that people such as Kerry, Biden, and Hillary Clinton are all hugely influential and powerful in their own rights.
Remember my friends... today is not simply the anniversary of 9/11/01... it's also the anniversary of 9/11/12.
(Scroll though the archives of this blog... return to my postings of 9/11/12 and scroll forward through the next few days... few weeks... worth of stand-alone posts and newsbites...)
Yes, folks... Benghazi... under Obama and Clinton... one President of the United States... the other supposedly the single most viable candidate in waiting for 2016.
But... today is a day to reflect, not to politicize - at least not in a proactive manner.
I'm now going to begin newsbiting. Where today's headlines and stories will take me is unknown till... well... till I come upon the stories which become the newsbites.
Do I plan to pull my punches? No. But for today... while I may "react" to what others have to say about Obama and last night's presidential address, I'll show respect to the Office by not proactively attacking the man who momentarily occupies it.
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* FOUR-PARTER... (Part 1 of 4)
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57602348/one-year-later-benghazis-lingering-issues/?tag=socsh
One year after the Sept. 11, 2012 terrorist attacks on Americans in Benghazi, Libya, no arrests have been reported but the Justice Department says investigators have made "very significant progress."
* PHONE TAPS ON HILLARY CLINTON... BARACK OBAMA... LEON PANETTA...?
* FOLKS... THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT IS THOROUGHLY POLITICIZED. COM'ON...
Four U.S. personnel, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens, were killed in mob assaults that moved from a U.S. diplomatic compound to a nearby CIA facility over a period of eight hours.
* FOLKS... WOULD ANY OF YOU SWEAR BY THAT "EIGHT HOURS" NUMBER? I WOULDN'T. MY POINT: A YEAR AFTER THE EVENT YOU'LL STILL FIND DIFFERENT TIMELINES REPORTED IN DIFFERENT MEDIA AND SPOKEN OF BY DIFFERENT POLITICIANS AND GOVERNMENT LEADERS.
(*SHRUG*)
Last month, government officials confirmed that sealed criminal charges have been filed against suspects. They are said to include Ahmed Khattalah, who gave interviews in Benghazi with several news organizations admitting he was at the scene of the attacks but insisting he was not the "ringleader."
Khattalah also said that nobody from the U.S. government had attempted to question him.
* YEP... SOUNDS LIKE THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE - AND THE REST OF THE U.S. GOVERNMENT - ARE DOING A REAL BANG UP JOB...
* THE MEDIA CAN FIND THIS GUY BUT THE CIA CAN'T...???
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and other Republican members of Congress recently sent a letter urging the new FBI Director James Comey to make Benghazi a top priority. Graham said that intelligence operatives have told him they have leads on suspects "but can't get approval to go after them."
* GRAHAM'S A FAKE, PHONY, FRAUD. DON'T TAKE A WORD HE'S REPORTED AS HAVING SAID AT FACE VALUE. THE REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP HAS PARTNERED MORE CLOSELY WITH HARRY REID AND THE DEMOCRATIC SENATE THAN THEY HAVE WITH OUR OWN PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN TRYING TO GET TO THE BOTTOM OF BENGHAZI.
A spokesman for the Justice Department tells CBS News that "the success of this investigation is a top priority" but would not provide details on its progress "to preserve its integrity."
* TO BE CONTINUED...
* CONTINUING... (Part 2 of 4)
White House spokesman Jay Carney, in a statement released Tuesday night, said, "We remain committed to bringing the perpetrators of the Benghazi attacks to justice and to ensuring the safety of our brave personnel serving overseas."
Benghazi remains a dangerous place, with militant groups continuing to attack offices of the relatively weak central government. Marking the one-year anniversary of the attack on the U.S. buildings, a bomb went off Wednesday outside a Foreign Ministry office in the city, causing significant damage but no confirmed deaths.
(*CLAP...CLAP...CLAP*)
* GREAT JOB, BARACK! GREAT JOB HILLARY!
The Obama administration continues to keep a great deal of information under wraps citing an ongoing investigation, national security and other reasons. The secrecy is an ongoing point of contention with Republicans in Congress. Tuesday, the House Oversight Committee sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry demanding the Bengahzi survivors be made available for interviews with Congress or else they may be subpoenaed.
* IT'S BEEN A YEAR, PEOPLE... A FRIGGIN' YEAR...
According to the letter, the State Department told Congress on Aug. 23 that "it was not prepared to support the request for transcribed interviews." If that doesn't change within two weeks, committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said "I will have no alternative but to consider the use of compulsory process."
* AGAIN, FOLKS... NOTE... ISSA IS A MERE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN; HE'S NOT THE SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. BOEHNER COULD HAVE APPOINTED A SELECT COMMITTEE AT ANY TIME OVER THE PAST YEAR. HE HASN'T. WHY?
The FBI, CIA, Director of National Intelligence, Defense Department, State Department and National Security Agency have rejected or failed to answer multiple Freedom of Information (FOI) requests made by CBS News, as well as appeals of the denials. The agencies cite exemptions related to ongoing investigations or national security.
* FOLKS... YOU'RE READING THIS, RIGHT? THIS IS CBS NEWS REPORTING THIS. THIS ISN'T RUMOR OR ACCUSATION - THIS IS TRUTH!
The conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch has filed four Benghazi-related FOI lawsuits against the Obama administration to try to produce withheld material. That includes the so-called "talking points" received by then-U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice prior to her appearance on news broadcasts in which she appeared to fault a spontaneous uprising rather than terrorists. After documents and testimony indicated that the attacks were widely seen as the work of terrorists from the start, nobody has explained how the video became a prevalent storyline.
* FOLKS... RICE WAS PROMOTED! OBAMA MADE HER HIS NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER!
* TO BE CONTINUED...
* CONTINUING... (Part 3 of 4)
Among other materials, CBS News is seeking a declassified version of surveillance camera video recorded during the attacks. The CIA had said it would be released around Thanksgiving of last year but after David Petraeus resigned as head of CIA amid a sex scandal, the video was never released.
(*SMIRK*)
CBS News is also seeking White House photos taken the night of the attacks and has asked for an accounting of President Obama's actions. The White House has refused to provide specifics other than saying with first news of the attacks, the president ordered that all necessary actions be taken.
* FOLKS... (FOLKS... FOLKS... FOLKS...!)
"From the moment [the President] was briefed on the Benghazi attack, the response effort was handled by the most senior national security officials in government," said a White House official.
* AND HOW'D THAT WORK OUT...?!?!
* MY GOD, PEOPLE... EXCUSE THE ABOVE SNARK... BUT THIS IS INSANE! HOW MANY TIMES DO WE NEED TO GO OVER THIS?! OBAMA, CLINTON, AND PANETTA LEFT OUR PEOPLE TO DIE! NO RESCUE! NO ATTEMPTED RESCUE!
Meantime, Issa's committee plans to convene a hearing as early as next week to examine the actions of a State Department-appointed Accountability Review Board (ARB). The ARB, led by Ambassador Thomas Pickering and Admiral Michael Mullen, investigated inadequate security leading up to the attacks. Witnesses have told congressional investigators that the ARB never asked them about some key issues. And the ARB acknowledged it did not interview some personnel considered important, including then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton who appointed four members of the ARB.
* UMM... YEAH... ONE MIGHT CONSIDER THE SECRETARY OF STATE "IMPORTANT."
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
* TO BE CONTINUED...
* CONCLUDING... (Part 4 of 4)
The only person connected in any way to the attacks known to have been arrested and gone to prison is the Egyptian filmmaker who produced the controversial "Innocence of Muslims" video: Nakoula Nakoula. However, the arrest wasn't for making the video, which is a legal, constitutionally-protected exercise of free speech. It was for violating his probation in an earlier bank fraud case dating back to 2010.
* AMERIKA... AMERIKA...
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
Obama administration officials will not identify the supposed crime the filmmaker had committed. Critics, including Graham, say Clinton knew from the start that terrorists were likely to blame for the attacks and accuse her of faulting the video to divert blame at the height of the President's re-election campaign.
* YA THINK...?!?!
Two weeks after the attacks, Nakoula was arrested and charged with probation violation. Today, he remains in a federal minimum security facility in California where he's penned a self-published book he calls "Innocence," dedicated to Stevens and the other three victims: Sean Smith, Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty. Nakoula told CBS News that nobody from the Obama administration ever spoke to him about his film, which he says is not "anti-Muslim." He claims it's about fighting for a "culture" and a "way of life" that are under siege.
* FOLKS... I HAVE NO DOUBT THAT MAKOULA IS A PIECE OF SHIT. BUT I ALSO HAVE NO DOUBT THAT OBAMA IS A PIECE OF SHIT. I HAVE NO DOUBT THAT CLINTON IS A PIECE OF SHIT. I HAVE NO DOUBT RICE IS A PIECE OF SHIT. I HAVE NO DOUBT PANETTA IS A PIECE OF SHIT. I HAVE NO DOUBT PETRAEUS IS A PIECE OF SHT. AND YET... ONLY MAKOULA IS IN JAIL.
Nakoula, a Christian, says he holds citizenship in both Egypt and the U.S. "I love the United States as my wife and Egypt as my mother," he says. "I'm not a criminal at all." He says it's ironic that the only person who's paid a price for what happened in Benghazi is not a terrorist but a Christian who tried to draw attention to a radical ideology.
Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., is one of the key Republicans investigating Benghazi. He tells CBS News "Benghazi matters as much today as it did on Sept. 11, 2012."
* UNFORTUNATELY, MOST AMERICANS DON'T WANT TO BE BOTHERED WITH THE TRUTH.
Gowdy wants to know why the State Department allowed a consulate that did not meet security requirements to remain open; what assets, if any, were en route when the siege ended; and was there any evidence upon which Susan Rice based her public pronouncements that this attack was a response to a video?
* THESE QUESTIONS SHOULD HAVE BEEN ANSWERED WITHIN A MONTH OF THE ATTACK! THAT IT'S BEEN A YEAR WITH NO ANSWERS... WHAT'S IT GONNA TAKE TO WAKE UP THE MASS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE ABOUT WHO AND WHAT THIS ADMINISTRATION IS?
The Justice Department says it's "using every tool and resource available...to ensure that anyone who played any part in that attack will face justice, no matter how long it takes and no matter how far we must go to find them."
* "JUSTICE" IN AMERIKA 2013 IS WHAT OBAMA SAYS IT IS. GOD HELP US.
http://www.politico.com/story/2013/09/wall-street-journal-elizabeth-obagy-fired-96637.html
The Syria "researcher" whose Wall Street Journal op-ed piece was cited by Secretary of State John Kerry and Sen. John McCain during congressional hearings about the use of force has been fired from the Institute for the Study of War for lying about having a Ph.D., the group announced on Wednesday.
“The Institute for the Study of War has learned and confirmed that, contrary to her representations, Ms. Elizabeth O’Bagy does not in fact have a Ph.D. degree from Georgetown University,” the institute said in a statement. “ISW has accordingly terminated Ms. O’Bagy’s employment, effective immediately.”
* GREAT "VETTING" FOLKS!
O’Bagy’s op-ed, “On the Front Lines of Syria’s Civil War,” was cited by both Kerry and McCain last week. McCain read from the piece last Tuesday to Kerry, calling it “an important op-ed by Dr. Elizabeth O’Bagy.” The next day, Kerry also brought up the piece before a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing and described it as a “very interesting article” and recommended that members read it.
But the piece had also come under fire for misrepresenting her affiliations.
* NOT MORE FAILED "VETTING...???"
Originally the op-ed only listed O’Bagy, 26, as only “a senior analyst” at the ISW, later adding a clarification that disclosed her connection to a Syrian rebel advocacy group.
* HER... CONNECTION... TO... A... SYRIAN... ADVOCACY... GROUP...!!!
“In addition to her role at the Institute for the Study of War, Ms. O’Bagy is affiliated with the Syrian Emergency Task Force, a nonprofit operating as a 501(c)(3) pending IRS approval that subcontracts with the U.S. and British governments to provide aid to the Syrian opposition,” the WSJ added in its clarification.
(*CLAP...CLAP...CLAP*)
* FOLKS... YA CAN'T MAKE THIS SHIT UP!
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