So, his big announcement speech included a gafferiffic moment, when Perry called the fallen Afghanistan soldiers “Special Operators.” The second half of his speech took off on optimism, which will be very effective in the primaries. Mike Murphy tweeted that this will soon become a contest between Romney & Perry, which is an easy prediction. But if Republicans nominate Perry, Obama will be the luckiest man on earth. I simply see no way Independents and moderates will take to this Bushesque character, whose slick preacher routine will not wear very well at all.
George W. Bush isn’t that far in the rear view mirror, so morphing Perry and Bush will be a breeze.
The exchange came on the same day as what’s being billed as a big Republican debate before the ridiculously overrated Ames straw poll. Now that Romney’s being defined as a “fragile” or “tentative” frontrunner, he’s going to have to take his campaign out of coast.
As he did so he ran headlong into a tree of the activist variety. They’re the Citizens for Community Improvement and they made Romney’s day a lot more complicated than he wanted it to be.
Democrats are rightly jumping all over Romney’s “corporations are people, my friend” line, which illustrates why the establishment hasn’t backed him yet. It’s not just tone deaf but an offensive thing to say with 10+ double-digit real unemployment. Anyone thinking sticking up for corporations in the current atmosphere is a winner is hopeless.
For any Democrat or progressive, what Romney said is red meat. It’s also fodder for the Obama campaign if Romney’s the nominee, but he isn’t yet.
However, if you’re a Republican who hasn’t quite warmed to Romney, I’m not so sure this clip is bad for slick Mitt.
It’s the first relaxed, un-weird and unscripted moment that comes with a pretty good punch line for Republican primary voters. He doesn’t come off as afraid to mix it up and commits himself strongly, even if he’s wrong about, well, just about every policy issue, unless you include his move to raise taxes as governor of Massachusetts to lure S&P to raise his state’s credit rating.
However, all of this is a great set up for Gov. Rick Perry’s entrance.
Still, Romney actually showed some life and real humanness today amidst it all, moments that have been very few for him.
I’m starting to think that what was missing from Romney’s campaign was a little healthy competition.
Rick Perry getting in the race may be the best thing that ever happened to Mitt Romney, because he clearly can’t be as nonchalant with Perry poised to enter. But all the hoopla with Perry is reminiscent of what Fred Thompson engendered before he jumped in and landed on his face. Perry’s not Thompson, but he’s also not Chris Christie, who fits the times much better.
Though why anyone would think Perry has a better chance of beating Obama than Romney is beyond me, though the “cowboy” thing in the era of Obama could seduce the neocons.
For Republicans outside the Perryverse, his approach to foreign policy and national security appear to be a natural extension of his personality: aggressive, unapologetic, and instinctive… all of the traits Republicans see as lacking in the Obama’s foreign policy.
“He’s a cowboy,” said Michael Goldfarb, former senior staffer on John McCain’s presidential campaign. “You have to assume he’d shoot first and ask questions later — which would be nice after four years of a leading from behind, too little too late foreign policy.”
Ten years into our involvement in the war in Afghanistan, in the mountains southwest of Kabul in the Tangi Valley, an elite group of Army Rangers were pinned down in a fight, when they called in their “Immediate Reaction Force,” according to reporting by Danger Room. It would be another elite U.S. fighting force, Navy SEALS, who would respond, but would end up blown out of the sky. It’s not Desert One, this mission having an even more desperately reckless cast to it. What was worth risking our finest elite force, around 7% of the total according to some experts, in a country that continues to revert back to it’s origin of a tribal nation?
“The Taliban knew which route the helicopter would take,” one unnamed Afghan official tells AFP. “That’s the only route, so they took position[s] on the either side of the valley on mountains and as the helicopter approached, they attacked it with rockets and other modern weapons.” “It was a trap that was set by a Taliban commander,” the official added. – Did a New Taliban Weapon Kill a Chopper Full of Navy SEALs?
The Taliban Haqqani network, operating in the extremely dangerous Wardak province, includes the most brutal fighting insurgents in Afghanistan, so any mission against them is high risk. U.S. Navy SEALS, as well as their Afghan counterparts, a translator and a working dow, came in via a U.S. Army A Special Operations MH-47G Chinook helicopter, seen as the best among these fighting machines but incredibly slow, bulky and vulnerable when navigating in between steep terrain. There are no defenses to deploy when a Chinook is within range of an RPG, though there are speculations that a newer weapon was involved. It was the worst single day loss of life since entering Afghanistan in 2001, with reports saying many of the Navy SEAL Team 6 who took down Osama bin Laden perished this day.
As the latest and worst news from Afghanistan continued to sink in, late yesterday, Pres. Obama addressed the S&P downgrade as the stock market plummeted, finishing with words about the horrific carnage that happened over the weekend. With words coming out of his mouth invoking his belief in America, the President’s grim facial features belied the pep talk that was weirdly surreal. It turned into the Twilight Zone when he got to the end, invoking the spirit of the fallen heroes while using the word “succeed” in the same sentence as Afghanistan.
“Their loss is a stark reminder of the risks that our men and women in uniform take every single day on behalf of their country,” Obama said from the White House. “I know that our troops will continue the hard work of transitioning to a stronger Afghan government and ensuring that Afghanistan is not a safe haven for terrorists. We will press on and succeed,” the US president said. – US will succeed in Afghanistan: Obama
Every time Pres. Obama comes out to speak now there is a vacuousness to his purpose that goes well beyond what words can hide. It’s like he doesn’t even believe himself anymore, as he babbles on without presenting a single plan. The least he could have done was call Congress back to Washington.
The crisis of economic confidence…
The out of touch talk about “We will press on and succeed” in Afghanistan…
It’s clear individual Democrats in Congress better take up the charge on jobs and growth, because Pres. Obama is acting politically paralyzed.
The good news for Obama is that his poll numbers remain decent amidst his floundering. Everything else, however, is reminiscent of the run-up to 1979 when America seemed incapable of acting like a great nation amidst economic, energy and foreign policy crises that were overwhelming the current occupant of the White House.
America ended up handing the country to Ronald Reagan, who ballooned the deficit, raised taxes over and over, and deserved impeachment after Iran-Contra, but got away with it because it was a different time and an assassination attempt had bonded Pres. Reagan to the people.
There is an out of control, out of touch, out of sync feeling Pres. Obama reveals every time he takes to the podium. He’s been incapable of leading the events playing out during his presidency, instead just reacting to them. Obama needs to change this perception and he has until Thanksgiving to do it.
I’ve been reading a lot about the Pentagon’s possible budget hit, with analysis all over the map. What this proves conclusively is that no one knows what will happen. That’s the real rub in Obama’s debt ceiling debacle. No one can possibly know the specifics in outlying years. There are too many unknown unknowables, to paraphrase big spender Rummy, which is proven by reading the myriad of opinions on what might manifest.
William Hartung, Director, Arms Security Project, Center for International Policy*:
“In the short-term, the budget deal crafted by the president and the congressional leadership gives the Pentagon virtually a free ride. It reduces projected Pentagon spending by less than one percent. These proposed reductions are further diluted by the fact that they will be counted against a broad ‘security’ category that will include the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies beyond the Pentagon proper. These miniscule reductions are unacceptable. Real cuts in Pentagon expenditures can be imposed without reducing our security. Any longer-term deal should reflect this reality.”
Andrew Bacevich, Professor, Boston University:
“The prospect of defense cuts ought to concentrate some minds in Washington. To avoid reductions that are arbitrary and capricious requires clarity of strategic purpose. The really big question is not how many billions should come out of the Pentagon’s bloated budget. No, the big question is this one: given our straitened economic circumstances and in light of the monumental catastrophes of the past decade, what is America’s proper role in the world? Simply reciting cliches about ‘global leadership’ won’t cut it. The time to make hard choices is at hand.”
Winslow Wheeler, head of the Strauss Military Reform Project at the Center for Defense Information, via Josh Rogin:
…said that the whole notion of the cuts is misleading anyway, because the numbers are being compared projections that were inaccurate in the first place.
“There will be reductions … but the actual figure is also masked by the fact that the debt deal is compared to a ten year CBO ‘baseline,’ which is [the fiscal] 2011 spending levels adjusted according to arcane rules and inflated by a highly unreliable projection of long term future inflation,” he said.
“The debt deal kicks the defense budget can down the road for this and future Congresses. People should not read precision and certainty into a political deal specifically designed to be uncertain and indistinct.”
Rather than cutting $400 billion in defense spending through 2023, as President Barack Obama had proposed in April, the current debt proposal trims $350 billion through 2024, effectively giving the Pentagon $50 billion more than it had been expecting over the next decade.
With the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan winding down, experts said, the overall change in defense spending practices could be minimal: Instead of cuts, the Pentagon merely could face slower growth.
“This is a good deal for defense when you probe under the numbers,” said Lawrence Korb, a defense expert at the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning research center. “It’s better than what the Defense Department was expecting.”
[...] But the bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform — known as the Bowles-Simpson proposal, for its two chairmen — proposed far deeper reductions last fall, saying the military could still maintain its power.
Korb, who studies defense budgets, said Congress could cut the defense baseline budget by $100 billion annually over the next decade and still spend more than it did during the height of the Cold War, adjusted for inflation. He noted that the baseline defense budget has climbed every year for 13 years, a record increase.
There is good reason why anyone who cares about the current legislation on the budget deficit should care about its near-term impact on national security:
The entire debate reflected a total disregard of the need for the State Department and other civil departments to play a major role in consolidating our victory in Iraq, supporting a transition to Afghan control in 2014, and preparing for the United States to play a major role in supporting democracy and political change in the Middle East.
This pressure comes at a time when the Defense Department has had years of growth in real spending, does little or no realistic long-term force planning, cannot control its manpower and procurement costs, and was already seeking cuts in programs between $78 billion and $400 billion. Even before the president added the goal of cutting the budget by $400 million over the next 12 years (long before the present debate), the Defense Department had planned to eliminate all real growth in defense spending after FY2013—which would reduce the total defense budget from $708 billion in FY2011 to $661 billion in FY2016—even if one assumes that the United States will still be spending $50 billion a year on its wars.
Not one word of the debate addressed the rise in the total interagency homeland defense budget to over $70 billion a year, a massive new effort that has grown with minimal efficiency and without adult supervision.
The new legislation layers a whole new set of cuts over the existing cuts forced on the defense secretary in preparing the FY2012 budget submission, which means massive new short-term pressure to find cuts—any cuts—in defense spending.
The debate that led up to the legislation produced a totally dishonest proposal for cuts in wartime spending amounting to $1 trillion dollars. This was matched by an equally dishonest Future Year Defense Program submission for FY2012 from the Defense Department, which claimed that the total cost of Afghanistan, Iraq, and the global war on terrorism would suddenly drop from $159 billion in FY2011 and $118 billion in FY2012 to a constant level of $50 billion in FY2013–2016. The real cost of our wars has to be over $75 billion in FY2013, and no one knows the out-year costs. As for the $1 trillion in savings, it would take 20 years to achieve a $1-trillion savings at a rate of $50 billion a year, and that would mean two decades in which the United States could not spend a dime on any overseas contingency.
But, the legislation is not going to survive in ways that have any real mid- or long-term impact. This becomes clear the moment anyone examines the real-world nature of the supposed longer-term plans for defense cuts in the legislation.
First, there is no way to usefully assess what the numbers involved actually mean or to regard them as politically credible. We are talking about making cuts to nonexistent plans and budget baselines some 12 years into the future.
Second, these cuts are to be made in undefined dollars, where no one can yet define current or constant dollars for the time period involved or estimate the extent to which the cost of defense rises faster than the average rate of future inflation.
Third, the cuts are purely political numbers that do not reflect any analysis of national security needs, where the cuts would come from, or the risk involved. They make no allowance for new contingency requirements. They are to be carried out over more than a decade without regard to future developments in the U.S. economy and competing needs for federal spending.
Fourth, the cuts are not based on any serious examination of the priority of national security spending relative to other discretionary spending and entitlements programs and sources of revenue. They do not look at the fact that national security—which everyone agrees is a legitimate priority for federal activity—costs less than 5 percent of a $14 trillion dollar economy even though we are still involved in two wars. They totally ignore the fact that it is the rising cost of medical treatment (rising from 5 to 6 percent of GDP in the past toward 19 percent) and the needs of an aging population (rising from 12 to 20 percent of the total) that is the key area that has pushed up our debt and deficit and where we need sound national programs—not simply budget cuts.
Fifth, the deadlines that could trigger the massive additional cuts are absurd. There is no credible way that the Special Joint Committee can really address the cuts that should be made in our national security efforts by November 23, 2011, or that the Congress as whole could properly evaluate the result for an up-or-down vote by December 23, 2011.
Lawrence Korb, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress; former Assistant Secretary of Defense*:
”The proposed deal does not go far enough in reining in a military budget which in real terms is higher than at any time since World War II. In fact, the total reductions over the next decade are likely to be less than the $400 billion proposed by President Obama.”
“If a congressional commission includes a serious, bipartisan review of defense strategy and expenditures, and abides by its recommendations, this is an opportunity for all sides to show they’re serious about constructing an American defense strategy that is effective and affordable for our times.”
On first blush it appears the $2.1 billion debt ceiling compromise hits the Pentagon’s budget pretty hard in the next decade, but the reality is that in the short term the $350 billion in defense cuts is smaller than what Pentagon officials had been preparing for. However, the deal also holds out the possibility that in the long term there could be even deeper cuts in defense spending if a bipartisan committee is unable to come up with an additional $1.2 trillion in savings by the end of this year.
…and just in case you haven’t been paying attention, which plays into Pres. Obama’s hands on national security, as well as obliterates the line between Democrats and Republicans, secrecy still rules(n/t Noah Shachtman of Danger Room).
The Senate Intelligence Committee rejected an amendment that would have required the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence to confront the problem of “secret law,” by which government agencies rely on legal authorities that are unknown or misunderstood by the public.
The amendment, proposed by Sen. Ron Wyden and Sen. Mark Udall, was rejected on a voice vote, according to the new Committee report on the FY2012 Intelligence Authorization Act.
“We remain very concerned that the U.S. government’s official interpretation of the Patriot Act is inconsistent with the public’s understanding of the law,” Senators Wyden and Udall wrote. “We believe that most members of the American public would be very surprised to learn how federal surveillance law is being interpreted in secret.”
Finally, Adm. Dennis Blair, former United States Director of National Intelligence in the Obama administration, for all you wonks (substance starts at 3 min. in). Blair starts with a terrific quote from John Cleese, which is pretty perfect considering the absurdity we’ve all had to endure the last weeks.
*TM Note: Attribution on this quote has been changed.
“I would say … that symbolically, that agreement is moving us to the point where we are having the final interment of John Maynard Keynes,” he said, referring to the British economist. “He normally died in 1946 but it appears we are going to put him to his final rest with this agreement.” – Huffington Post
Some quote, isn’t it? Sen. Durbin said it just before his entertaining colloquy with Sen. McCain, which I saw on C-SPAN and tweeted this afternoon.
We’ve got a congressional Committee with powers beyond what any hand picked pack of legislative jackals should have.
Oh, and while cuts are found, Republicans get to play new games to prove Democrats don’t stand for much. Tea Party politics is crazy awful, but they stand for something and can go back to their district with proof.
…and Mitch McConnell, he’s looking awfully smart tonight. So, remember the people who hailed Pres. Obama when Mitch came forward with his devious little idea? We’ll be visiting it a lot between now and 2012.
Nothing is agreed to until everything is agreed to.
“Tell your henchman to stop saying nice things about me,” McConnell, the Senate minority leader, told Reid earlier this week, according to people familiar with the conversation. “It hurts me.” Even as he’s sought to project immovable unity with House Speaker John Boehner, the prospects for an eleventh-hour deal rest largely on McConnell’s shoulders. For weeks, he’s kept an open line of communication with Vice President Joe Biden, with whom he struck a deal with in December to extend Bush-era tax cuts, and he heard from President Barack Obama on Saturday, too. In the meantime, he’s been trying to keep anxious Republican senators at bay. – Mitch McConnell’s moment: Debt ceiling deal maker or deal breaker?
All eyes are on Sen. Mitch McConnell, since he “conceded” the point that no deal can happen without Pres. Obama, who is now fully engaged in the final stage. McConnell is also Speaker Boehner’s lifeline, with the letter signed by 43 Republican senators saying Reid’s bill is dead quid pro quo for Reid’s letter on the Boehner bill.
The details of what’s going on between McConnell and Boehner are being kept among a select few. Let’s face it though, McConnell cannot be trusted by Democrats or the White House, a point that is close to irrelevant at this late moment, which is exactly why McConnell waited so long to get involved. He wants to force Pres. Obama into a situation where he feels he has no choice but to make deals no Democrat should make.
So, McConnell and Biden are talking, while anyone watching this spectacle can see Reid and McConnell are not.
Sen. Mitch McConnell’s original plan is now part of the Reid bill, with the triggers at issue on how to force a second round of budget cuts if the bicameral congressional committee being concocted to work on the austerity plan can’t come to an agreement. As Politico and other outlets are reporting, many Democrats believe McConnell is pushing for the second round as a set up for the inevitable and planned breakdown of any committee, so he can get more cuts upon failure. Republicans also want to make Social Security part of their triggers, which went over with a thud, with Chuck Todd reporting there are other triggers beyond entitlements.
Democrats want the trigger to include tax increases, but that’s a line House Republicans won’t cross, so it all depends on finding moderate Republic—, yeah right. Only four senators refused to sign McConnell’s letter stating Republicans intend to vote down Reid’s bill, a vote which was scheduled for 1:00 a.m. Sunday, but that was moved because Sen. Reid was told the White House talks are progressing.
God only knows what that means.
The target is $1.6 – $1.8 million in cuts before year’s end.
[...] The Democrats bigger worry is Boehner, who shows signs of simply running-out-the-clock, playing hard-to-get with Obama and hoping the White House will give into his demands. The speaker and McConnell are in regular contact, but having pushed the fight this far, the GOP has reason to fear it will lose support from its traditional business allies if there isn’t more progress before markets open Monday, one day before the threat of default. – GOP leaders ‘fully engaged’ with W.H., but Dems skeptical on debt deal
No doubt you’re sick to death of reading this from me, but the 14th Amendment remains a shot for Pres. Obama, regardless of the legal imbroglio that would follow. Because what people keep forgetting in all their prognostications is that Pres. Obama simply cannot allow the U.S. to default. One can only guess the fight that would ensue over which House Republican would serve up impeachment if it happened.
With the tension building and the last moment approaching, as McConnell bet on all along, which is why he offered up his devious plan in the first place, the bigger worry for Democrats is that Pres. Obama will offer any number of compromises to stave off a dismal Monday on Wall Street.
So, the question is how much further to the right will the McConnell-Boehner-Reid bill have to go before the White House cries “uncle”? …and will House Democrats balk for the first time and channel their own inner Tea Party rage if what comes back to the House is political poison on entitlements?
The painful negotiations to resolve the crisis have caught the attention of troops in Afghanistan, where Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was quizzed repeatedly on Saturday by soldiers and Marines worried about their paychecks. In Kandahar and Helmand Provinces, Admiral Mullen said it remained uncertain where money would be found if the government defaulted. Regardless of budget talks in Washington, the mission for American troops in Afghanistan would not halt, he said. – New York Times
Well, at least Harry can count, not only doing proper math, but it’s likely he’s the one who has the votes he needs, while the jury’s out for Mr. Boehner.
In the battle of budget scores, the Senate Democrats deficit reduction bill is the clear winner thus far over an alternative by Speaker John Boehner, which has had to be pulled back from a floor vote for retooling. [...] A second factor is the Senate’s willingness to take advantage of CBO baseline rules and claim large savings from winding down US military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. – Reid savings trumps Boehner plan
As for the White House, Pres. Obama has a fairly clear schedule today, according to reports, including Chuck Todd. After a day that had even Jay Carney on “Hardball,” you can bet this only means frantic movement behind the scenes to get this thing done.
Robert Reich peels back some of the self-interest behind S&P’s motives, as Wall Street starts to be a real player as well.
Anyone else find it vaguely amusing Reid and Senate Democrats are pushing to end wars in order to get a deal on the debt ceiling?
Art offers his perspective as a movement progressive activist.
As Washington delves further into detached madness we learn of new facts about the Gang of Six plan. They aim to alter Social Security by abolishing COLA and thus reduce benefits folks get incrementally as people get older.
Congressman DeFazio went to the House floor to explain how the Gangsters of Six plan to screw the poor, the elderly, the disabled, our veterans and middle class while letting the rich off the hook:
Note what he said here:
…there’s this other little impact they’re not mentioning. If you’re earning $20,000 a year, the tax brackets get adjusted every year. Well, they wouldn’t get adjusted so much any more under the chained CPI. So someone who earns $20,000 a year over ten years would see their taxes go up 14 percent. But, guess what? For the rich people, ha. You earn $500,000 a year, you’re already at the top, their taxes will only go up 0.3 percent. Three-tenths of one percent. Fourteen percent for someone who earns $20,000 a year. Point three percent for someone who earns $500,000.[...]
All of this, all combined of this great Gang of Six would save $4 trillion over ten years. That is, seniors will pay more, working people will pay more, veterans will pay more. Rich people? Nah. Not so much. But it would save $4 trillion.
Guess what. If we let all the Bush tax cuts expire the end of next year, all of them and the stupid Social Security tax holiday, that would be $5 trillion over ten years and we wouldn’t have cut Social Security. We wouldn’t have cut veterans’ benefits. We wouldn’t have asked low-income and middle-income people to pay more in taxes. Now does that make more sense? I think so…
What a scheme. The devil himself must revel in it. Immoral.
Daniel Marans from Strengthen Social Security highlights new reports which show how very bad these changes in SS could be on taxpayers:
A recent report by the Congress’s Joint Committee on Taxation… shows that the revenue increases that would result from the chained CPI should also give progressives pause. The report says that the chained CPI would greatly increase the tax burden of low- and moderate-income workers, while barely affecting millionaires.
For example, if the chained CPI were enacted in December 2012, in 2021 the tax liability of low-income workers with incomes between $10,000 and $20,000 would increase by 14.5 percent, while those with incomes of $1 million and above would see only a 0.1% increase, according to the report.
The chained CPI would raise revenues by slowing the rates at which tax brackets and deductions rise….
So ending COLA will affect not just folks on SS or veterans pay. It will impact millions of Americans’ tax rates, especially the working class:
Mike Hauswirth, tax policy analyst for the Democratic staff of the House Ways and Means Committee, explained why workers without any income tax burden could still see their effective tax liability increase.
Under the chained CPI, low-income tax credits such as the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), the Child Tax Credit and the Saver’s Credit would phase out for many workers at the bottom of the earnings distribution who currently receive them in full.
That is because the low-income tax credits in question would be indexed to the chained CPI. If workers’ income grew faster than the chained CPI, then they would outgrow eligibility for the tax credits.
So with these changes workers will find they won’t qualify for tax credits they used to get. Four trillion will be raised- off the backs of blue collar and poor Americans. Nauseating.
The thought of these crooks in congress trying to cut my SSI benefits all while hiking taxes on working class Americans and ensuring benefits from the safety net will be cut for everyone else is something that brings me to tears. Fight we must must. Use the tools below to email, post and tweet this information to everyone you know. And yes urge all you know to use this handy list to contact DC:
White House White House Comments Line: 202-456-1111
Mitt Romney as the Republican nominee will provide a wealth of ammunition for Democrats. The late Sen. Ted Kennedy provides the path and the foreshadowing of what could come.
Politico’s piece today reveals why, which also provides un-aired as well as aired ads from Ted Kennedy’s old campaign archives. Romney’s troubles begin with Bain Capital.
A company that laid off hundreds of employees. A federal “bailout” to rescue a failing bank. Mitt Romney, at the center of it all.
[...] The never-aired “bailout” ad [see below], shared with POLITICO by one of Kennedy’s advisers, remains an unexploded grenade from that race, underscoring Romney’s vulnerability in the first presidential election fought since the 2008 financial meltdown.
According to former Kennedy advisers, the ad never ran because it turned out to be unnecessary: Kennedy had already broken Romney with a series of ads tying him to layoffs in Indiana.
[...] Greg Mueller, the conservative public relations man and former Pat Buchanan adviser, argued that the offensive against Romney was well under way: “They’re trying to hit him on Bain, companies that Bain had under their umbrella, where people lost their jobs.”
[...] In one instance, Romney sat on the board of a medical supply company, Damon Corp., which later paid $119 million in penalties for billing unnecessary blood tests to Medicare during the period of Romney’s involvement.
The Tea Party crew has said they’ll do everything to stop Romney, but I haven’t seen or heard much from them lately.
In the believe it or not column, Romney’s finally spoken on the debt ceiling debate. A balanced budget amendment is his “line in the sand.” What a putz. Oh, and Mr. Romney also believes that civilians shouldn’t control the military.
Just what we need, another national candidate from the Republicans who believes the role of commander in chief is to be a puppet of his generals.
For years, the American military has believed that public anger over government-linked corruption has helped swell the Taliban’s ranks, and that Ahmed Wali Karzai played a central role in that corruption. He has repeatedly denied any links to Afghan drug trafficking.
According to three American military officials, in April 2009 Gen. David D. McKiernan, then the top American commander in Afghanistan, told subordinates that he wanted them to gather any evidence that might tie the president’s half brother to the drug trade. “He put the word out that he wanted to ‘burn’ Ahmed Wali Karzai,” one of the military officials said.
The gnashing of teeth over Ahmed Wali Karzai is because of the vacuum he leaves.
Also in Afghanistan, the man who mutilated Aisha, part of the torturers who cut off her nose, has been released. All sorts of excuses are being used, but the reality is that all the U.S. military might and money cannot change the culture of Afghanistan to save the women.
Now, with Pres. Karzai’s half brother dead, someone who was corrupt and also had an important role in negotiations with the Taliban and others, a dead end for the U.S. in Afghanistan seems even more apparent.
If you want one reason why Barack Obama doesn’t deserve reelection this is it.
If the Republican Party were a normal party, it would take advantage of this amazing moment. It is being offered the deal of the century: trillions of dollars in spending cuts in exchange for a few hundred million dollars of revenue increases. – The Mother of All No-Brainers
The bookend to David Brooks is Frank Rich, who evidently has finally awakened to the actual Barack Obama, 3 years too late. This was after appalling political analysis that should not only have gotten him laughed out of the opinion racket, but rendered his views worthless. Rich preferred to play games in the primaries rather than learn, then help readers understand Barack Obama’s political philosophy:
But as long as the likely Democratic nominee keeps partying like it’s 2008 while everyone else refights the battles of yesteryear, he will continue to be underestimated every step of the way.
One of the people who underestimated Barack Obama was Frank Rich, but not in the manner he originally meant. It’s because he was too besotted to identify candidate Obama’s squishy Republicanism.
Mr. Rich also predicted a Democratic “civil war” if Hillary didn’t cool it, though even Rachel Maddow did this, but Rich went several ugly steps further, to make his points:
A race-tinged brawl at the convention, some nine weeks before Election Day, will not be a Hallmark moment. As Mr. Wilkins reiterated to me last week, it will be a flashback to the Democratic civil war of 1968, a suicide for the party no matter which victor ends up holding the rancid spoils.
The “suicide for the party” is indeed happening, just a lot later and through the very politician Mr. Rich exalted.
Rich could have looked at Obama’s Illinois record, his statements about being non-ideological, about being more of a mediator between two opposing views, but he chose fan politics instead, ignorantly blinded by what the outcome could eventually be.
Paul Krugman laid out the economics for Rich and his ilk, but there were many clues, the most important coming from candidate Obama himself:
“I think that I have the capacity to get people to recognize themselves in each other. I think that I have the ability to make people get beyond some of the divisions that plague our society and to focus on common sense and reason and that’s been in short supply over the last several years. I’m not an ideologue, never have been. Even during my younger days when I was tempted by, you know, sort of more radical or left wing politics, there was a part of me that always was a little bit conservative in that sense; that believes that you make progress by sitting down listening to people, recognizing everybody’s concerns, seeing other people’s points of views and then making decisions.” – Barack Obama, 5.14.07 (on ABC’s “This Week”)
Pres. Obama adopting the Republican economic model has set the Democratic Party back, how far and for how long it’s hard to tell.
Obama’s position is now where Republicans have placed the new center, which will dog any Democratic candidate and president who believes progressive philosophy is not only more sound, but imperative to save the middle class.
Any Democrat not starting by offering tax cuts and even targeting the safety net will now be considered “extreme” or “far left” by the new center, you know, because Barack Obama did it. Progressive politics then becomes a harder sell. Where that leaves the “professional Left” is anyone’s guess, but it’s nowhere good.
That is unless Obama’s economic Republicanism is abandoned wholesale, which is unlikely when you look at the behavior of elite Democrats today, politicians who don’t understand that by “winning” the Democratic Party is actually losing their identity. Though there are some signs of life in small quarters of Congress, with a few Democrats recognizing that the small differences that used to exist between the parties, Pres. Obama has obliterated, not only on economics, but including on matters of war and peace.
There’s something even more chilling about Pres. Obama’s economic Republicanism. If he’s doing this now, what will he do if he’s reelected, facing no other elections in his future, able to carve the path as he sees it?
It’s not Republicans who should start worrying about Obama’s reelection, it’s Democrats.
As a liberal who supported Pres. Obama’s Afghanistan plan when he first began it, I simply do not understand how anyone can support it today, at least not when judging what’s in U.S. interests.
Nineteen months ago the president announced the surge strategy in hopes of stabilizing Afghanistan and strengthening its military and police forces. Today, despite vast investment in training and equipping Afghan forces, the country’s deep-seated instability, rampant corruption and, in some cases, compromised loyalties endure. Extending our commitment of combat troops will not remedy that situation.
Sometimes our national security warrants extreme sacrifices, and our troops are prepared to make them when asked. In this case, however, there is little reason to believe that the continuing commitment of tens of thousands of troops on a sprawling nation-building mission in Afghanistan will make America safer.
National security experts, including the former C.I.A. director Leon E. Panetta, have noted that Al Qaeda’s presence in Afghanistan has been greatly diminished. Today there are probably fewer than 100 low-level Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda has a much larger presence in a number of other nations.
Our focus shouldn’t be establishing new institutions in Afghanistan, but concentrating on terrorist organizations with global reach. And our military and intelligence organizations have proved repeatedly that they can take the fight to the terrorists without a huge military footprint.
It’s easy to understand why our troops being in Afghanistan is good for the Afghans, because Pres. Karzai simply isn’t doing his job and there’s no evidence he will. Women continue to suffer in Afghanistan, an issue to which Karzai is indifferent, even as real progress has been made, because the women and girls had only one way to go and that’s up.
In the past, I’ve argued with people over staying in Afghanistan, but after herculean efforts on the part of our troops, it’s simply not worth one more life, not one. I feel the same way about Iraq, too, but I felt that way from the beginning the Bush-Cheney misadventure that distracted the U.S. from getting bin Laden.
It’s also not as if we won’t continue to be involved in Afghanistan, because they’re sitting next to Pakistan in an important region. This begs the question of when regional powers, including India, China and Russia, will start doing their part? The U.S. is leaving Afghanistan, so they’d better step up.
Senators Merkeley and Udall are correct, Pres. Obama should change course, but he won’t because he’s prosecuting this war like a Republican, which is one reason why Afghanistan is starting to look like a bigger disaster than ever, because the same stubbornness that kept Bush in Iraq is keeping Obama from drawing down faster in Afghanistan.
Again and again, John and his team asked themselves who else might be living in that compound. They came up with five or six alternatives; bin Laden was always the best explanation.
This went on for months. By about February, John told his bosses, including Panetta, that the CIA could keep trying, but the information was unlikely to get any better. He told Panetta this might be their best chance to find bin Laden and it would not last forever. Panetta made that same point to the president
Panetta held regular meetings on the hunt, often concluding with an around-the-table poll: How sure are you that this is bin Laden?
John was always bullish, rating his confidence as high as 80 percent.
Others weren’t so sure, especially those who had been in the room for operations that went bad.
Let’s see, Gaza or gossip, which shall it be? For almost every news outlet this week it was the latter, while the former is where the action is. From James Zogby writing over at Huffington Post:
When it comes to issues involving Israel, politicians in Washington can become quite hysterical, making the dumbest remarks or doing the most illogical things. Evidence of such bizarre behavior abounds, and this week provided several examples.
Taking top prize would be newly-elected Republican Senator Mark Kirk of Illinois. Kirk wants the U.S. to use military assets to stop the humanitarian flotilla on its way to Gaza. He wrote that the United States should “make available all necessary special operations and naval support to the Israeli Navy to effectively disable flotilla vessels before they can pose a threat to Israeli coastal security or put Israeli lives at risk”.
[...] … All this might just be dismissed as “political pandering” or more “harmless hot air” from politicians who specialize in both. But it is dangerous and has consequences. In the first place, actions and statements like these send absolutely horrible messages overseas about the inability of American politics to deal fairly with any Middle East issue that involves Israel. And so these behaviors end up undercutting U.S. diplomacy. Secondly, these actions, and the bizarrely skewed, one-sided politics they reflect, tie the hands (or, at times, force the hands) of Administrations, negatively impacting the ability of policymakers to act. And finally, in the end, these comments and actions embolden hardliners in Israel and the Arab World, who both come to believe that there are no restraints on Israeli behavior and no way that Arab concerns will be heard or respected in U.S. policy debates.
However, it’s just not on the radar of the American media. Too dangerous. Controversial. Inflammatory. It makes network heads uncomfortable.
Instead it’s all about Who’s more pro Israel?, one of the most dangerous political games we play in this country. But at every presidential election, play it we do. Stacy has an “In the News” diary up about Sec. Clinton announcing administration talks with the Muslim Brotherhood, which on cue is freaking out the Right.
There’s nothing more serious than Middle East politics and it shouldn’t be treated as a political parlor game, but that’s exactly what Politico did this week. In a long, gossipy piece, Ben Smith traded on 2008 canard that Obama is an iffy friend of Israel by mining staunchly pro Clinton Jewish quarters to stir the currents of discontent. It’s a continuation of the conservative campaign to discredit Pres. Obama and portray him as soft on Israel, which is a falsehood, but some media outlets just can’t resist.
Smith has written about this before. Here’s an example of the well from which Smith drew his alleged proof:
“I’m hearing a tremendous amount of skittishness from pro-Israel voters who voted for Obama and now are questioning whether they did the right thing or not,” said Betsy Sheerr, the former head of an abortion-rights-supporting, pro-Israel PAC in Philadelphia, who said she continues to support Obama, with only mild reservations. “I’m hearing a lot of ‘Oh, if we’d only elected Hillary instead.’”
Even Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who spoke to POLITICO to combat the story line of Jewish defections, said she’d detected a level of anxiety in a recent visit to a senior center in her South Florida district.
[...] The qualms that many Jewish Democrats express about Obama date back to his emergence onto the national scene in 2007. Though he had warm relations with Chicago’s Jewish community, he had also been friends with leading Palestinian activists, unusual in the Democratic establishment. And though he seemed to be trying to take a conventionally pro-Israel stand, he was a novice at the complicated politics of the America-Israel relationship, and his sheer inexperience showed at times.
Why does being “friends with leading Palestinian activists” make Obama less pro-Israel?
It takes a friend to tell you the truth sometimes, with Obama’s stance on Israeli settlements something that most experts agree must be dealt with by PM Netanyahu, though on the denial goes.
Now it appears Obama’s supporters are readying to hit back at this continuing media meme. From Greg Sargent:
A group of well-known figures in the Jewish community has been in discussions with senior Obama adviser David Axelrod about how to respond to the criticism, which is expected to intensify as the campaign heats up. Among them: Alan Solow, the former head of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations; former Congressmen Mel Levine and Robert Wexler; and executive Penny Pritzker.
“We will have highly credible spokespeople and surrogates speak out in a general manner in support of what this administration has done, and articulate it in a way that we think will resonate with voters who care about this issue,” Solow said in an interview. “We will meet with supporters who have expressed concerns or want to be briefed on these issues on a one-on-one basis.”
“We got close to 80 percent of the vote among Jewish Americans in 2008, but we had to aggressively bat down efforts to divide the community and to inflame,” David Axelrod told me. “Plainly we have to be at least as assiduous about it this time. If we’re passive in response it would be a mistake.”
Politico’s Smith got in the usual comments, with divisions quickly revealed or satisfied when the name of Dennis Ross is invoked:
The qualms that many Jewish Democrats express about Obama date back to his emergence onto the national scene in 2007. Though he had warm relations with Chicago’s Jewish community, he had also been friends with leading Palestinian activists, unusual in the Democratic establishment. And though he seemed to be trying to take a conventionally pro-Israel stand, he was a novice at the complicated politics of the America-Israel relationship, and his sheer inexperience showed at times.
A Philadelphia Democrat and pro-Israel activist, Joe Wolfson, recalled a similar progression.
“What got me past Obama in the recent election was Dennis Ross — I heard him speak in Philadelphia and I had many of my concerns allayed,” Wolfson said. “Now, I think I’m like many pro-Israel Democrats now who are looking to see whether we can vote Republican.”
Pres. Obama has deep challenges for 2012, but “pro-Israel Democrats” voting Republican isn’t a main one.
Our media is incredibly juvenile when it comes to covering the Middle East. Intramural political gossip substituting for serious mining of the challenges in the region continue to be the norm.
James Zogby noted what’s said around here a lot.
And so, far from being harmless hysteria or just plain dumb, all this posturing can be damaging and dangerous. It is a good part of the reason why we are in the mess we are in the Middle East and why a just resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict appears to be so intractable.
Every time the media chooses gossip over big stories like what’s happening surrounding the Gaza flotilla, solving problems in the Middle East gets a little further away, which doesn’t help anyone, especially Israel.
That President Barack Obama would have popularized the phrase “audacity of hope,” after which we named our boat, now seems a cruel hoax, particularly as many of us recalled the high hopes we had once harbored for Obama the candidate. Instead of an “audacity of hope,” Obama the president has often displayed a “paucity of courage.” – Ray McGovern
The politics of “Israel versus the Palestinians,” which is the way the U.S. media reports on this region, as well as how our politicians play it, puts Pres. Obama in an untenable position.
Pres. Obama has been tying himself in knots over “no hostilities” or “war” in Libya since his latest military adventure began. Hey, but this is what happens when all people pay attention to is the mouthpiece media, which in the U.S. gets squeamish about challenging any administration on war.
Let’s face it, folks, war has now become our primary export, which has been the case for quite some time, though since the Bush era’s financial implosion, it’s all we do.
Air Force and Navy aircraft are still flying hundreds of strike missions over Libya despite the Obama administration’s claim that American forces are playing only a limited support role in the NATO operation.
An Africa Command (AFRICOM) spokeswoman confirmed Wednesday that since NATO’s Operation Unified Protector (OUP) took over from the American-led Operation Odyssey Dawn on March 31, the U.S. military has flown hundreds of strike sorties. Previously, Washington had claimed that it was mostly providing intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and tanker support to NATO forces operating over Libya.
“U.S. aircraft continue to fly support [ISR and refueling] missions, as well as strike sorties under NATO tasking,” AFRICOM spokeswoman Nicole Dalrymple said in an emailed statement. “As of today, and since 31 March, the U.S. has flown a total of 3,475 sorties in support of OUP. Of those, 801 were strike sorties, 132 of which actually dropped ordnance.”
A group of people using bombs and small arms attacked the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul Tuesday, and fighting was ongoing with Afghan security forces, Chief of Criminal Investigation Mohammed Zahir told CNN. – Bombers attack luxury hotel in Kabul (update)
Abdul Qadeer Fitrat, the governor of Afghanistan’s central bank, resigned his position and fled the country, saying that the government interfered in his corruption investigation into Kabul Bank. He said that he left Afghanistan after receiving reports from “credible sources” that his life was in danger due to the investigation. He is now in the United States, where he has residency.
“My life was completely in danger and this was particularly true after I spoke to the parliament and exposed some people who are responsible for the crisis of Kabul Bank,” Mr Fitrat said on Monday.
The embezzlement at Kabul Bank, Afghanistan’s largest private bank, almost led to its collapse last year after it was discovered that hundreds of millions of dollars had gone missing. …
“During [the] last 10 months during Kabul Bank crisis, I continuously pressed for the creation of a special prosecution, for the creation of a special tribunal to investigate and prosecute those who were involved in Kabul Bank’s fraud,” he told the BBC. “I did not receive any information that there is a credible plan to prosecute, to investigate and prosecute these individuals. The high political authorities of the country was responsible [for blocking] these efforts,” he alleged.
He said he left the country after he received information that his life was in danger from “credible sources”.
Politico has a piece today on Bachmann’s thin legislative record. Fair enough to cover, but let’s not pretend such things weren’t overlooked for the boys.
When George W. Bush ran for president, not only was his abysmal business record shrugged off, but the traditional press didn’t pay any attention at all regarding Bush’s very iffy National Guard record, not to mention the fact that his presidential candidacy was predicated on his father. When John Kerry was attacked by the “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth,” Fox News channel not only encouraged Sean Hannity to broadcast lies about Sen. Kerry’s hero war record, but traditional, new media and cable outlets let the Right get away with swiftboating him by allowing the false equivalency of Jerome Corsi to be taken seriously. Ronald Reagan likely had Alzheimer’s before his second term, but nobody blew the whistle on the Gipper, while letting him off the hook for Iran-Contra, because the bond the people had with him after the assassination attempt was real. Now, I realize these issues aren’t of the same variety, but scrutiny is scrutiny and when it’s not, it’s not.
Rep. Michele Bachmann is surging in the GOP presidential polls and barnstorming Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, but as she sprints toward the front of the Republican pack, there’s a major hole in her political résumé: legislation.
Now in her third House term, Bachmann has never had a bill or resolution she’s sponsored signed into law, and she’s never wielded a committee gavel, either at the full or subcommittee level. Bachmann’s amendments and bills have rarely been considered by any committee, even with the House under GOP control. In a chamber that rewards substantive policy work and insider maneuvering, Bachmann has shunned the inside game, choosing to be more of a bomb thrower than a legislator.
Candidate Barack Obama had the thinnest of records out of Illinois, but that didn’t bother anyone when I was writing about Obama’s flyover of the first debate in Carson City, NV, or when he came to the health care forum in Las Vegas saying he’d have a plan in 3 months, totally whiffing the moment. Voting “present” in the Illinois state senate innumerable times didn’t bother the breathless cable yakkers either. Women found out just how committed Pres. Obama was to our freedoms in the Affordability Care Act, as well as his decision on abortion recently in his decision to sell out D.C. women.
But then again, considering the lousy Democratic leadership record Pres. Obama has had in his first term, making private insurance deals, big Pharma compacts, channeling Bush on war and plotting assassinations around the globe, not to mention endless parroting of the Republican economic message, perhaps Politico is correct. Records do matter.
Let’s just not pretend this isn’t a double standard if Michele Bachmann is judged less than a man who’s done absolutely nothing worthy of note before running for president.
Unless, that is, one anti-war speech convinced you that candidate Obama was a progressive fighter, which in that case your hopeless to begin with.
The Pentagon confirmed Monday that more service members have been discharged under “don’t ask, don’t tell” pending certification of the policy’s repeal, with one individual’s discharge approved as recently as Thursday. A total of four airmen have been discharged under the policy in the last several weeks, Pentagon spokeswoman Eileen Lainez confirmed Monday.
Bob Gates leaves on Thursday, with Leon Panetta due to take charge, but there’s no evidence the discharges will stop anytime soon.
On this day in history, June 26, 1973, former White House counsel John W. Dean told the Senate Watergate Committee about an “enemies list” kept by the Nixon White House.
Some links to go with your morning coffee, tea, or Mimosa:
~On a similar note, this embarrassment could have been avoided had Obama complied with the legal niceties of going to war and getting Congressional approval. Listening to the WH and State Dept. talk about the conflict that they say doesn’t involve “hostilities” is like a bad acid trip back to the Bush years.
~And it doesn’t help Obama that Admiral Sam Locklear confirmed to GOP Rep. Mike Turner that the scope of the war in Libya includes taking out Qaddafi and he also stated that he anticipates needing boots on the ground. Does that mean Obama lied to us about the mission, given he said this in March during his speech to the nation: “Broadening our military mission to include regime change would be a mistake…”?
Ok, this is an ACTUAL commercial airing in Europe and when I first watched it I thought it was going to be some sort of ad for a gay resort. Turns out, it’s about the importance of keeping your HEALTH INSURANCE information with you at all times.
Why doesn’t Harvard Pilgrim or Blue Cross Blue Shield do an add campaign like that?
~The U.S. and Israeli govt have been doing everything in their considerable power to prevent the U.S. boat that is taking part in the Flotilla2 to Gaza, from leaving port in Greece. A complaint has now been launched against the boat saying it’s not seaworthy. All week long the State Dept. blasted the Flotilla participants as needlessly provoking Israel and made a thinly-veiled threat on Friday that they could be in violation of the law prohibiting giving material aid to terrorists. I have been following the Flotilla2 issue very closely on Twitter and I can tell you that many are interpreting Secretary Clinton’s statements as being a green light for Israel to attack the Flotilla.
~A great article about how and why one of the world’s great economists, Joe Stiglitz, has been virtually ignored by the White House (which tells you a little bit about Obama’s view of economics- and it’s not good.)
~Obama, the GLBT community and the enthusiasm gap. Kerry Eleveld reminds the Obama administration that there is more to winning the hearts and minds of the gay community (and elections!) than simply assuming we have no one else to vote for.
~Former Alaska Senate candidate Joe Miller has to reimburse the state of Alaska for over $17,000 in costs associated with his bid to overturn Lisa Murkowski’s write-in victory.
~Speaking of Fox, check out this link, it’s too funny. It shows actual news headlines vs. Fox News headlines.
~Sheila Bair, the outgoing head of the FDIC and a proponent of much-needed reforms, warns that legislators and banks (and the WH?) seem to be in danger of forgetting the lessons learned from the 2008 global financial crisis. Lessons, what lessons? Who in the GOP learned anything from the crisis? Who at the Chamber of Commerce and who at the Treasury Department?
~The Washington Post has an article that raises questions about the motives behind President Obama’s promotion of clean technology. You be the judge.
~Washington Post hack Dana Milbank once again portrays the progressive base’s complaints as mere squawking but of course, when conservatives complain about their politicians, well, that’s just principled disagreement, right? Honestly, I sometimes find it hard to believe that Milbank gets paid to write this stuff.
From Josh Rogin, a statement from the Congressional Progressive Caucus Peace and Security Taskforce (update, 6.25.11):
The Co-Chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus Peace and Security Taskforce call on Congress and the President to immediately end our war in Libya. The US has been engaged in hostilities for over 90 days without congressional approval, which undermines not only the powers of the legislative branch but also the legal checks and balances put in place nearly 40 years ago to avoid abuse by any single branch of government.
We call on our colleagues in Congress to exercise their legitimate authority and oversight and immediately block any funding for this war. Before the Executive branch further weakens the War Powers Resolution, and before we attack another country in the name of our “responsibility to protect,” we must recommit ourselves to our Constitutional duty and obligation to hold the purse strings and the right to declare war. For decades, the House recognized the need for appropriate checks and balances before another war was waged. We must do the same. We call on Congress to exhibit similar foresight by promptly ending this war and pledging to uphold the laws that characterize America’s commitment to democratic governance.
This statement makes a mockery of the obsequiese White House stenography in the Politico piece entitled “Libya vote a rebuke the White House can live with.”
____________original column below____________
Congress proved its ineptitude, with David Dayen having a perfect description of Speaker Boehner’s incompetence, which cost him the votes of Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann. Say what you will about Nancy Pelosi, but she wouldn’t bring up such a critical vote if she didn’t have the numbers.
To sum up House preferences on Libya: we don’t like POTUS not asking us for permission, but we don’t want any responsibility either. – Daniel Drezner
Politico has the rundown on the arm twisting, with three dozen Dems voting to rebuke Pres. Obama, ignoring Sec. Clinton’s campaign for him, while stopping shy of using their power of the purse:
It appears that a last-minute White House lobbying effort to stave off Democratic defections worked — at least on the spending-limitation bill. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asked House Democrats to back their president in a closed-door meeting in the Capitol Thursday, and National Security Adviser Tom Donilon summoned a small group of liberals to the Situation Room at 7 a..m. Friday morning for a classified briefing that may have influenced a handful of votes.
Still, the House rejection of a one-year authorization of the use of force in Libya earlier on Friday represented the most serious congressional challenge to the president’s war-making authority in more than a decade. It was a symbolic vote, but one that was felt on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Now comes Josh Rogin with an “exclusive” confirming what was said on the audio here by “Buck” McKeon (h/t BF), with Rogin naming the man making the assassination allegations.
So, regardless of the Obama administration saying they are not trying to assassinate Libya’s Gadhafi that’s exactly what’s going on, to no one’s surprise. From Rogin:
House Armed Services Committee member Mike Turner (R-OH) told The Cable that U.S. Admiral Samuel Locklear, commander of the NATO Joint Operations Command in Naples, Italy, told him last month that NATO forces are actively targeting and trying to kill Qaddafi, despite the fact that the Obama administration continues to insist that “regime change” is not the goal and is not authorized by the U.N. mandate authorizing the war.
“The U.N. authorization had three components: blockade, no fly zone, and civil protection. And Admiral Locklear explained that the scope of civil protection was being interpreted to permit the removal of the chain of command of Qaddafi’s military, which includes Qaddafi,” Turner said. “He said that currently is the mission as NATO has defined.”
“I believed that we were [targeting Qaddafi] but that confirmed it,” Turner said. “I believe the scope that NATO is pursuing is beyond what is contemplated in civil protection, so they’re exceeding the mission.”
Now, I’m not squeamish in the least about killing Gadhafi in a declared war where our vital interests are at stake, providing Congress weighs in to approve the funding and the action.
But Pres. Obama waging a “kinetic military action” with NATO as a fig leaf for an assassination plot to effect regime change is something else, especially when the President is doing it on the fly, without oversight and by lying to the American people about what he’s doing.
Pres. Obama has chosen a path that pretends we’re not at war or that “hostilities” don’t exist, as he tries to dance around the War Powers Act. The Pentagon blew this out of the water by giving “imminent danger” pay to “service members who fly planes over Libya or serve on ships within 110 nautical miles of its shores,” as reported by the Washington Post.
All of this kabuki while NATO targets Gadhafi for assassination, because Pres. Obama waved his commander in chief wand.
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Good morning and welcome to Sunday.
