Obama Got Osama… So What?

It really doesn’t matter.

My belief is that the Bush Administration knew where Osama Bin Ladin was for a number of years and intentionally didn’t kill him.

I believe this was confirmed when it was leaked that the NSA was monitoring his phone calls. Many years later, most of us understand that if we can monitor your phone calls we know where your phone… is.
I, along with Sec. State Rice, thought it was a crime to have leaked such information as monitoring Osama’s phone led to an incredible amount of extremely valuable intelligence. But I was unaware that such a leak did not reach the bar determining a “crime”, unlike Navy-SEAL Bisonette disclosing in his book “No Easy Day” who shot Osama and when he did it.  It’s worth noting, Leon Panetta sees clearly this man needs to be crucified (alas, we would have to send him to the Middle East for this punishment) at the moment of this typing.

Enter Mike as the Bush apologist… (Don’t get used to this.)
My feeling that it was OK to leave Osama Bin Ladin alive (at that moment) was also related to my belief that the Left was hoping he would turn up dead so they could begin berating the Bush Administration for perpetuating another “unnecessary” war. (Note that any war not being conducted under a Leftist Administration is “unnecessary”)  This type of “good when I do it, bad when you do it” politics only seems to manifest itself on one side of the aisle.  But that’s another post.

Well, now Osama is dead… So What?

At this very second the U.S. Embassy in Yemen has been attacked.  Keeping score?  That’s Libya, Egypt and Yemen.  (Update, Add: Oman, Iraq, Tunisia, Algeria)(Update, Add: Sudan, Pakistan)(Update, Add: Bangladesh, Berlin, London, Sudan, Yemen again…)

Secretary Clinton is in Morocco… the presser was more of a begging apology than a stance against violence.  It’s my biased observation that the State Department is concerned “in the strongest terms”.  That’s “scared” to you and me.  This is the fundamental problem we have in the world.  We have Leftists faced with fighting Leftists.  All our home-grown Leftists can do is condemn the violence… but not the ideology.

We, the U.S., are fighting a war against Statism. (At home and Abroad) In this specific case of the Middle East it’s a variant of Socialism known as Theocracy. The Theocrats wish to establish a “Caliphate” made up of the entire Middle East.  The leaders of this movement want to create an exclusively Muslim area intended to include Israel.  Not sure how that would work?  Neither are the Jews.

You might be saying to yourself… “Wow, that kinda seems like a bad idea.”
Indeed.  But our current Administration cannot allow us to pass judgements on Theocracies versus other ideologies such as their personal brand of Socialism because the similarities would be difficult to ignore.  (The only difference between the two Governing Theories is Theocrats switch out the top of the pyramid from “The State” to “A Deity of Choice”.  That’s it.  All else remains, structurally, the same.)

The connection the Left does not want you to make is that Socialism, and all of its variants, are the root of all evil. It’s exactly this ideology and its brethren that demonize the individual and view life as expendable to the greater good of the state and/or religion.  (There is nothing new about Religious States.  Catholicism had a solid run if you recall.)

So, in this War on Terror 2.0 the Obama Administration is personalizing it.  (I think their rhetoric throughout both Bush Administration’s pushed them into a corner on this to some degree.  They have graduated from Clinton’s “Tomahawk Diplomacy” to Obama’s “Drone Diplomacy”.  The Left likes killing people, just not up close and personal.)

They have attempted to “keep it personal” by pinning all evil on Osama Bin Ladin and lately Al Qaeda.  Sec. State Clinton’s thesis subject, Saul Alinsky, wrote about this approach in the book Rules for Radicals if you have one lying around.  “Personalize it.”  Never get in a debate regarding ideology or theory… (If you’re any kind of Socialist, you will lose. My words, not his.)

Well, clearly Osama Bin Ladin was not the root of all evil, he was merely a symptom.  The fact that we are still killing “leaders” of Al Qaeda we’ve never heard of before should legitimize my point.  (Update: IS, ISIL, ISIS, DAESH)

What the Administration is trying to ignore, deny, obfuscate, is that we are fighting a war against an Idea not a human being.  We are fighting a war against an ideology that shares many, if not most, of the societal ideals our current Leftist leaders here in the U.S. promote.  We are not fighting a war against any specific person… remember, people are expendable and can be quickly replaced by the closest fellow traveler.  The Muslim Brotherhood understands that theirs is a Mission of Ideology… a Mission of Faith… a Mission of Social Justice.  They must find the Great Satan’s attempt to define them differently as hypocritical and juvenile at best.

This is a very important time in our history, a turning point if you will.  (Domestically and Abroad)  It is a time that must be clearly thought about by every U.S. Citizen.  What happens in the next ten years will determine the quality of life our children will experience through their old age.  The definitions of Freedom and Liberty are being challenged globally by those wielding ideas… very, very bad ideas.

No one wants to live thinking they and their loved ones are, or will be, in imminent danger.

But there is a valuable lesson here…

What it is and what we wish it to be are most often at odds.

(091312)

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Panetta on Benghazi

“I should have had a V-8!” – What Mr. Leon Panetta, Secretary of Defense, should have limited is opening remarks to during this mornings Benghazi Hearings.

Listening to Leon Panetta one might think the deployment of Diplomats throughout the world occurred for the very first time under his watch, and none of the dangers associated with such an endeavor had ever been experienced before. In other words, we just could never have foreseen the potential threats to Ambassador Stevens and the Benghazi Embassy staff.

Mr. Panetta has also stated that it cannot be the Department of Defense’s responsibility to defend our Diplomats abroad.
Mr. Panetta has stated that even if it was DoD’s responsibility… “there was no actionable intelligence available” in order for defense forces to come to the aid of our diplomats.  Along with that, he told the hearing committee that there was not the available “armed” aircraft to respond… “it would have taken too long to arm the aircraft needed… and we didn’t have the resources to fuel those craft for the trip”.

Mr. Panetta is asking us to suspend reason and burn our maps, in order for all of this to make sense.

To see reason here requires those who nod approvingly at such a statement to forget that we had a man on the ground actively “lazing” the enemy mortar site sending rounds into the compound in addition to a Drone watching the events transpiring below plus later interviews with those at Aviano Air Base stating that they could have been there had they been called.  Finally it requires one to believe that while we have armed Drones crawling all over the Middle East, with ranges allowing them to travel all over the region, that none were available to be temporarily diverted to the area under attack.  (According to Mr. Panetta, the only Drone available was an unarmed one… which apparently was strangely unable to supply the intelligence needed to discern whether aid for those under attack was needed.  I would offer that if a Drone’s “intelligence” is enough for those driving it to decide whether or not a U.S. Citizen can be executed without due process that the “intelligence” being gleaned from the Benghazi site should have been enough to figure those on the ground  needed help.  And… what kind of surveillance equipment did this drone have?  Camera’s to see the firefight… and the active lazing of targets?  Listening devices to pick up the frantic radio chatter?  Radio equipment capable of communicating this information to those who could make the decisions to send help?  Or was this Drone void of these capabilities?  Yes or No?
Mr. Panetta made the assertion that forces could not be deployed because of other “possible threats” to our other consulates in the region, while mere moments earlier stating that there were no imminent threats to our personnel.  But wait a minute… I thought there were no discernible threats in the region on our Embassies.

My question is; Which is it Mr. Panetta? There seem to be three stories here.

Either there were threats detected on our Embassies “across the region” as you said out loud this morning, or there were not… as you also stated out loud this morning.
Either you did have the ability to send forces to aid those under attack and chose not to, or you did not.
Either it is your responsibility to defend our diplomats, or it is not… (nor ever has it been.)

You said there were… and there were not… in the same opening remarks.

If, Sir, it is not the Dept. of Defense’s responsibility, then whose is it?  State?  CIA? New York’s Finest? Who!

You stated that perimeter security was the responsibility “of the Host country”… so you, and the Department of Defense in Cooperation with the Department of State are incapable of evaluating the ability of the Host country to provide such security?  Seriously?  Do you need to take a minute and read back what just escaped your mouth?  To say such a statement is “unbelievable” is charitable.

Even if none of this was “your problem”, why didn’t you help?  “The U.S. Armed Forces are not a 911 service standing by to come to the rescue of our citizens all over the world.”  Really?  I would think the U.S. citizenry, and many of our soldiers, would be surprised to hear such a statement.  If that is not within their “job description”, then what exactly IS their job description Mr. Secretary?

I am stunned that this country has survived to be 250 years old and rising to the position of world hyper-power while, according to Mr. Panetta, never having learned all of these “unforeseen lessons” this tragedy has suddenly taught us.  May be in another 250 years we’ll get a handle on this whole Diplomacy thing.  This entire Administration acts as if none of this Major League Governing Stuff has ever been done before and we are learning as we go.

Absolutely Amazing.

I’m not sure I have enough liquor to get through this hearing…

The Evil Twin

Could it be this simple?

An angry, identical, sibling demanding every favor ever accumulated be cashed in on the attempt to keep custody of her children under threat of “blowing the whistle” if she doesn’t get her way… and meaning it.

It appears that an unacknowledged act of war has led to the exposure of domestic extortion between sisters.

Patreaus, Allen, Broadwell and Kelley are dealing with the Evil Twin.

While I’m angry that WE are talking about this at all, I have to confess that I haven’t enjoyed this cliché as much as I am right now since Dean Koontz wrote about Santa Clause.

However, I have about 30 seconds of my attention left for this matter because I just can’t seem to get over our best and brightest being gunned down, suffocated and sodomized.

Forget Kahwam and this pathetic soap opera…

Remember Stevens, Woods, Smith and Doherty.

And try to remember Terry, Zapata and hundreds of innocent Mexican citizens.