Benghazi Debacle

Joe Klein from Time Magazine has a new piece just posted titled Benghazi: The October Mirage. Here’s the link

http://swampland.time.com/2012/10/12/benghazi-the-october-mirage/?iid=sl-main-arenapage

He starts out “For the life of me, I can’t understand why the Republicans are harping so hard on the Benghazi security debacle–except, maybe, you know…politics.”

I looked up the meaning of debacle just to make sure that it hasn’t changed. According to Miriam Webster it is:  a complete failure – fiasco.

Why should we treat a complete failure – fiasco as a mirage? When is a complete failure or fiasco when it relates to the security of Americans not a problem for the President? Election year or not, why is Joe Klein and Time Magazine giving our current Commander-in-Chief a pass on the complete failure?

He even goes so far as to blame the lack of security at the Benghazi U.S. Consulate on Paul Ryan’s budget. Guess what, Paul Ryan is not the Commander-in-Chief and his budget has not been passed by Congress so how could anything in his proposed budget affect the current security of U.S. citizens in Benghazi?

Opinion pieces are fine and we all agree that politicians bend the truth, especially when trying to get elected. But, wouldn’t it be nice for a change if major media outlets like Time Magazine hold some standard of truth-telling for their own editors, journalists and commentators.

More from Klein: The deaths of Chris Stephens and the others was a preventable tragedy. That it happened is outrageous. But these sort of incidents have been exceedingly rare since 2001, and the Obama Administration has attacked and decimated Al Qaeda in a more efficient and effective way than either of its predecessors, Bush or Clinton. (To be fair, Clinton didn’t have the drone technology–but he did have special forces who might have taken out Bin Laden after the two attacks on US Embassies in 1997 and the USS Cole in 2000.)

This was a preventable tragedy. That it happened is outrageous! But let’s not harp on that. This was a debacle and a preventable tragedy but it is the Republicans fault for “harping” on it? President Obama is not subject to scrutiny for any failures or tragedies on his watch because he ordered Navy Seals to go get Bin Laden?

Klein: The Benghazi incident was a failure that blemishes, but does not diminish the Obama Administration’s tremendous success in the war against Al Qaeda.
So Klein has toned down this ‘failure’ for Obama from a debacle and preventable tragedy to a blemish. Obama himself toned it down to “bumps in the road.”

Klein says that this criticism of this debacle and preventable tragedy is “foolish and insulting to the American people.” What really is foolish and insulting is when a respected journalist, who should be appalled at administration debacles and preventable tragedies which result in the loss of American lives, gives no more weight to their deaths than calling them mere blemishes on Obama’s record.

In his last paragraph Klein goes so far as to categorize the “harping” of Romney and Ryan on this preventable debacle as unpatriotic. Who is being unpatriotic here? Is it not unpatriotic to relegate four dead Americans whose deaths were preventable by this administration to the lowly standard of blemishes or bumps in the road?

Klein wants Romney to come out publicly and agree with Obama on this. “… it would be nice, and even patriotic, if Romney would support the President …” Why would any American want to support the President on this?

This was a preventable tragedy on Obama’s watch. President Obama has succeeded in turning a preventable tragedy into a full scale debacle by lying about it and blaming his failure on everyone but himself.

By Klein’s own standard this is 1) a debacle, 2) a preventable tragedy, and 3) a failure. Yet, Joe Klein and Time Magazine continue to blame Romney, Ryan and the Republicans for harping on it. Time Magazine and Joe Klein, why can’t you and your media cohorts raise this issue to the level of scrutiny it deserves? It would be nice and even patriotic to properly report the failures of President Obama to your readership.

Those four brave Americans are not mere blemishes. Those four coffins were no mirage.

Why Lie?

Part one – lie
President Obama lied. There I wrote it and I truly believe it. I know there is a staggering amount of so-called journalists and editors from major media outlets who can not come close to writing this simple three word sentence. President Obama lied.

President Obama lied. The evidence is there. One month after the 9-11 attack on Ambassador Stevens and approximately 40 American consulate workers by Al Qeada, it is clear that President Obama, his administration and his campaign staff in a concerted effort to deceive the American electorate lied about what happened.

His reason? He’s running to keep his job. Even though from his first debate appearance it seems that he doesn’t much want to. Doesn’t it appear that Michelle Obama wants to remain as First Lady a hell of a lot more than Barack Obama wants to remain President?

It’s so obvious that perpetrating this lie is some kind of political strategy – blame a video. The worst part on top of the killing of the killing of Americans on our consulate soil is Obama blaming the video incited additional attacks on embassies in other countries putting more Americans in harms way. Nice going liar.

It also appears that the Obama administration may have fed a false intelligence briefing to a Daily Beast reporter to back up the claim that they believed the Benghazi attack was about the video. Lie upon lie. The a few days later they parade out Susan Rice to lie on TV to anyone who will listen.  Lie upon lie upon lie.

Mass media eats up all the lies as if they’ve been starving in the desert for forty days and these lies are the only thing that can save them from starvation.  Should have checked the warning on the packaging – DO NOT EAT – these lies are hazardous to your health, the health of your organization, the health of American security abroad and the well-being of a great nation.

The media even though they know that this is a firestorm for the President have been complicit in dripping the lies through sporadic reports to help quell the flames. If this was a republican administration it would be bombshells dropping on the front pages daily and lead stories on every newscast laying out the evidence piece by piece. Instead, we get a page three blurb, oh by the way, we have conflicting reports, enough said, nothing to see here.

Part two – Keep lying
Then after approaching a presidential debate in the same manner he has approached running the government for four years, with complete indifference, Obama releases a September jobs report with so many record breaking statistics you would think that he single handedly jump-started every abandoned factory in the U.S. The only problem is none of the numbers add up. They are in complete conflict with the reality of the situation which is the worst job market in thirty years.

He either is the greatest wizard since the inception of time or just a clueless man behind a curtain pushing more falsehoods. Sadly, there is no fairy godmother to help him get us back on track. He’s had universities hand him a piece of paper so he thinks he’s got a brain, the DNC has told him he’s got a heart and he sits in the Oval Office picking drone targets so he thinks he must have courage. But in the end he just got knocked in the head into believing his own fairy tale.

Yet, our vast media machine who purports to give us the straight scoop on what’s going on can’t bring themselves to write the scathing investigative reports that their readership and viewership deserve. They’d rather lock themselves into the same fairy tale that they’ve been sold for the last four years.

Sorry guys but the movie’s got to end. The country can not take another four years of this sorry fairy tale. It’s time to start clicking those heels back to Chicago for Barack Obama there is no place like home.

The Mirror Ball Presidency – deflect all light.

President Obama to Matt Lauer, February 2009 – “If I don’t have this done in three years, then there’s going to be a one-term proposition.”

Since President Obama is doing his best Jimmy Carter impression these days I feel it is our duty to make him the best ex-president he can be and grant him his one-term wish.

Every one is so nostalgic these days. Don’t you just miss the late-seventies? It was such a feel good time, long gas lines, odd/even days, outrageous prices, inflation, economic stagnation, the Mideast in turmoil, that pesky Iran Hostage Crisis. But we did have that whole disco thing going for us!

Talk about Deja Vu, Obama has this country suffering from Saturday Night Fever. Can’t you see him in that white suit with the open-collared black shirt.

The big difference between Carter and Obama is economically Carter had better numbers. Unemployment was 7.7% at its worst under Carter. It has remained over 8% under Obama and Carter did not use any $800 Billion stimulus tricks during his administration.

Under Carter, the trade deficit was 1.7% of GDP. Under Obama it is 3.4%. That is double!

Foreign policy wise Carter was also better. At least Carter tried to free the hostages. He sent in a rescue mission but his dollar decimated Defense Department couldn’t get their spare parts copters off the ground.

Obama just ignored the indicators in Libya which got our Ambassador and three other brave Americans killed. He was busy doing that whole campaigning thing and needed his rest. He went to bed rather than react to the breaking news and immediately send in help. Hey, a missing Ambassador is nothing to lose sleep over. It can wait until morning.

Obama did issue an attack, though. He had his campaign staff go after Romney. Obama knows an enemy when he sees one.

If only the security of the Libyan embassy staff had warranted the same level of presidential interest as Romney’s reaction to the Cairo Embassy tweets maybe we wouldn’t have been watching Obama give flag-draped coffin speeches.

But Obama’s got that disco ball spinning and every time someone tries to shine a light on his failures the media acts like those little mirrors and helps him deflect the scrutiny.

Patience

I’m glad to see President Obama auditioning for a spot on the View. He’s going to make a great ex-President and this would be a great gig for him. I hope he lands it.

Post-presidency Obama says he wants to work with kids. This is no surprise as this is how he treats the whole country, as if he’s the only adult in the room and he’s the only one that’s got everything figured out. In fact, he acts just like a teenager who knows everything and defies his parents at every turn despite their trying to save him from self-destructive behavior.

Every once in a while he lets his guard down but wants us to give him a pass because he’s young and doesn’t know any better. So I lied in my campaign ads, that’s what teenagers (er, politicians) do. Let’s move on.

Michele Obama says it takes a lot of patience to be the President. Yes, it seems like President Obama has an unlimited amount of patience.

He’s waiting patiently to see this whole economy thing work itself out.

He’s waiting patiently for the rising number of poor to outnumber every one else.

He’s waiting patiently for the unemployed to drop off the roles of those looking for work.

He’s waiting patiently for those darn terrorists to stop hating Americans.

He’s waiting patiently for Iran to stop their pursuit of nuclear weapons.

He’s waiting patiently as China takes over the seas around Japan.

He’s waiting patiently as the national debt puts us into bankruptcy.

He’s waiting patiently as Russia kicks out our USAID workers.

He’s waiting patiently for someone, anyone, to do something so he has someone else to blame for this mess.

Can’t Bush come out and make a speech so we can blame him for the last four years?

Four years of patience. That’s the new word for lazy. Too lazy to work with Congress on a real budget – we’ll just keep continuing resolutions going; too lazy to meet with the Prime Minister of Israel while the Mideast is on fire; too lazy to do any governing but he’s got plenty of energy to campaign for another four years of laziness. I mean patience.

Obama is just like that do nothing colleague you have at work (if your lucky enough to have a job). You know the one who works harder at not doing their job than just doing what they are supposed to be doing. Every one sees it, management somehow tolerates it because it’s easier than trying to fire them. And that is always the person who will not hesitate to tell you how hard they are working. Yes, Obama is the treadmill president, a lot of movement but no progress.

Obama may have plenty of patience but my dwindling income and our diminished standing in the world has got me itching for what he promised four years ago- change in leadership. I can only hope.

Where is the Outrage?

Our Libyan consulate in Benghazi is in ruins, four Americans are dead, including the Ambassador and all Obama has to say is that this is a bump on the road to democracy. Where is the outrage?

This is the USS Cole, this is WTC 1993, this is 9-11! These are acts of war upon the United States and its people. Where are the headlines? How has this story just been brushed aside?

Some hack no one has heard of puts out a movie no one sees and he’s a more powerful influence on Mideast politics than the President of the United States? Obama should hire him as Secretary of State.

Romney nails Obama’s apology strategy contemporaneously with the attacks on our embassy in Cairo and the press reports it as if Romney is in the wrong? Almost two weeks later the administration makes an admission that Al-Qeada is behind the attacks confirming Romney’s stance. But Obama and Clinton continue the apology ads in Pakistan?

Why would we apologize for a video we had nothing to do with and which had nothing to do with the death of our Ambassador? Everyone else in the world recognized the Al-Qeada flag flying over our Egyptian embassy but the Obama Administration?

Obama is now coming around to the feeling that maybe it wasn’t just a mob action in Libya that killed four Americans. You think?

Why are there so few asking the hard questions on Libya? If this was a random protest why was it not held at our embassy in Tripoli? Why would a random mob protest on some outlying mission of no political import if they didn’t know that the Ambassador was there? And why the hell was our Ambassador who knew he was on an Al-Qeada kill list strolling around Benghazi on 9-11?

Why were all these top-secret documents that were stolen in an unsecured mission and not in our secure embassy compound in Tripoli?

This is the biggest foreign policy screw up since the Iran Hostage Crisis. Where is the outrage?

Libya

One week after our Ambassador and three other brave American citizens are killed, the Obama administration finally figures out that this was a “self-evident” terrorist attack. Why does it take a week to figure it out if it was self-evident? This blows my mind that they can say this stuff with a straight face after denying it for a week.

Here is my homage to the man who hides from his own policies because they may not get him re-elected.

Libya (to the tune Ohio by Neil Young)

No soldiers, Obama’s orders
Embassies you’re on your own
Missed the brief about the slaughter
Four dead in Libya

Gotta get down to it
Obama’s tearing us down
Should have seen this long ago
Our flag’s burning
Americans dead on the ground
Press won’t question what went on

No soldiers, Obama’s orders
Embassies you’re on your own
Arab Spring’s 9/11 stunner
Four dead in Libya

Gotta get down to it
Appeasement’s not getting it done
Should’ve seen this long ago
What are you doing?
Ambassador’s dead on the ground
High price to learn you’re not The One

No soldiers, Obama’s orders
Embassies you’re on your own
Arab Spring’s 9/11 slaughter
Four dead in Libya
Four dead in Libya (How many more?)
Four dead in Libya

Better Off?

Are you better off?

This is the big question these days and should be on the mind of every voter. First, let’s list who is better off today than four years ago.

1) The Iranian nuclear program
2) The Taliban
3) The Muslim Brotherhood
4) China
5) The PLO
6) Hezbollah
7) Mexican Cartels

Now let’s see who is NOT better off today than they were four years ago:

1) Anyone who pays bills or buys groceries and gas in the U.S.A.
2) Europeans
3) Japanese
4) Anyone in the Middle East who opposes strict Sharia Law

Essentially, our enemies are better off and our citizens and allies are worse off. And the majority of folks in the press keep telling us how rosy the picture is. Seriously? Let’s take a look.

Inflation is up. Income is declining. The economy is still stalled. Unemployment is still over 8% and higher if you count those who have stopped looking. The biggest tax hike in U.S. history – the UN-Affordable Health Care Act is about to hit our already tight pocket books. The Middle East and Northern Africa are in complete chaos including dead Americans. The debt clock is ticking faster than it ever has, rising above $16 trillion. And, for two years in a row Obama’s budget was unanimously rejected by his own party. So can someone please tell me why we should re-elect him?

If you can’t even convince one democrat that your budget is workable why would we want you to have another four years of the same nonsensical approach to governing? It’s not the Republicans fault Obama can’t even compromise with his own party.

If you can’t see that heightened security on 9-11 (9-11 HELLO) for our overseas diplomats in countries that historically target Americans, especially a few days after you call in a drone strike on one of the Al-Qaeda leaders (Al-Qaeda you remember them right, the guys guys who attacked us on what date? Oh, 9-11!), might be a good idea, why would we want you leading our foreign policy initiatives for another four years?

You think maybe someone in this administration could have had the foresight to recognize that terrorists who have celebrated killing Americans on 9-11 for the last ten years might celebrate again. And how better to do that than killing more Americans!

How can nearly 50% of this country subscribe to willful blindness when it comes to the failures of this current president? Why aren’t the Dems trying to run him out of town on a rail? If you have a D next to your name you get a complete pass?

I’m starting to think that even Joe Biden would be a better president and he may be dimmer than Sarah Palin. Yes, republicans she fits in well with all the other 15 minutes of fame reality TV stars but no one with any common sense wants her anywhere near the White House.

How can the republicans be so inept in a campaign that they are running dead even with a candidate who is on paper worse than Jimmy Carter? Obama has the audacity to use the slogan Forward in his campaign? When he has made zero progress in four years? Obama is moving us forward all right, forward into the late-seventies. The only thing missing is odd/even gas days.

Why would anyone want to align themselves with a political party if you are expected to support a candidate who is so inept? Every democrat in this country should be ashamed of themselves for promoting this ineffectual individual. And by ineffectual, I mean at governing not campaigning. I must say he is good at that.

Every republican should be embarrassed that they can’t convince a solid majority of the general public that the current president may be the worst since Andrew Johnson.  Boy I am glad I am an independent.

Is Romney the greatest thing since sliced bread, no. But, as governor, Romney worked with the opposition party and closed tax loopholes. Two things Obama has not even attempted in four years.

Bottom line from this Independent mind, Romney is not as bad as he is portrayed in the media and Obama is way worse than media is reporting.

If we re-elect this spend-our-way-out-of-debt, appeasement-to-our-enemy, thumb-our-nose-at-our-allies president we are going to be in serious trouble as a nation.

If anyone wants to try and convince me why Obama deserves re-election, I’m all ears.

I am an independent American voter!

This is the voice of one independent voter. I have no affiliation to any political party. The only difference I see between Republicans and Democrats is their funding source which seems to be unlimited on both sides.

When did we get to the point that the old Groucho Marx song Whatever it is you’re for I’m against it is the only way to conduct political debate in this country? The political process has become almost a joke.

But with that said I am a realist and have to make a decision based on what is available to me on the ballot as I do not want to waste my vote or worse not voice it. So I must decide which of these major candidates is going to LEAD this country in the right direction. I believe there are many in this country who feel the same as I do.

I need to sift through talking points and press releases masquerading as news reports. I have to uncover alternate reporting outlets from the networks, cable news ridiculousness, newspaper conglomerates, talk radio punditry and party affiliated “fact checker” sites. I really need to find a news source that isn’t in the tank for one side or the other. So far I have been unsuccessful.

This unsuccessful search for true independent reporting has led me here. Here I’ll be giving you my independent opinion and asking for yours in the comment section. Republicans and Democrats feel free to chime in but be prepared for the hard questions that none of you wants to ask your candidates or that you won’t yourself.