Khatallah’s Acquittals on Benghazi Murders Show, Again, Need for New System

Rush Limbaugh

Andrew C. McCarthy  "There was never going to be justice for the American war dead of the Benghazi attack. The jihadist strike on the eleventh anniversary of the 9/11 atrocities was too bound up in the politics of the 2012 presidential election. Moreover, the prosecution of the lone defendant charged in the attack was a product of the progressive ideological insistence that acts of war can seamlessly be downgraded into mere penal offenses, adjudicated with all the due-process strictures that implies. 

"This bull-headed conceit is a fiction, and thus the experiment is a failure. 

"It is not my purpose to make a competing “I told you so” claim that Ahmed Abu Khatallah should have been designated an enemy combatant and consigned to military detention and trial. Yesterday, after an eight-week trial in civilian federal court in Washington, Khatallah was acquitted on the most important charges against him — the charges that arose out of the murders of U.S. ambassador J. Christopher Stephens, State Department employee Sean Smith, and CIA security contractors Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods. Despite these 14 acquittals, he was convicted on four charges involving material support for terrorism, destruction of property, and carrying a firearm during a violent crime. There is no reason to believe that the outcome would have been more just — or even that we would have an outcome yet — had the case been assigned to the existing, deeply flawed military-commission system.

"Instead, in positing two points, I want to restate a plea that we stop playing with fire and move beyond the deadening “military v. civilian” debate — Is it a war or is it a crime? — that has undermined American counterterrorism for 16 years." . . .
 Full article

So what has it been like at Club Gitmo?

The Matt Lauer discussions

Katie Pavlich: The Details of Matt Lauer's Alleged Predatory Sexual Behavior Are Horrifying   . . . "Late last night Variety Magazine, whose journalists have been working on the Lauer story for months, released stunning and horrifying details of his alleged behavior." 

"   As the co-host of NBC’s “Today,” Matt Lauer once gave a colleague a sex toy as a present. It included an explicit note about how he wanted to use it on her, which left her mortified.

   On another day, he summoned a different female employee to his office, and then dropped his pants, showing her his penis. After the employee declined to do anything, visibly shaken, he reprimanded her for not engaging in a sexual act.
   He would sometimes quiz female producers about who they’d slept with, offering to trade names. And he loved to engage in a crass quiz game with men and women in the office: “f—, marry, or kill,” in which he would identify the female co-hosts that he’d most like to sleep with. . . .

Katie Couric: Matt Lauer 'Pinches Me on the A*s a Lot'  . . . "As far back as 2012 there were signs that all was not right with "Today" show co-host Matt Lauer. Appearing on Andy Cohen's "Watch What Happens Live" that year, Katie Couric, who began hosting the show with Lauer in 1997, was asked about his most annoying habit. " . . .

Jonah Goldberg: Matt Lauer, Fox News, and How Tribalism Affects the Press
. . . "But back to the sexual-harassment thing. One of my longstanding gripes is how when conservatives do something bad, it’s proof of the inherent badness of conservatives and conservatism. But when liberals do something bad, it is immediately turned into an indictment of America itself. Joe McCarthy’s excesses were a window into the nature of conservatism, according to historians, intellectuals, and journalists. But when liberals — Attorney General Palmer, Woodrow Wilson, et al. — did far worse, the villain was America itself. When conservatives are racist, it is because they are conservatives. When liberals are racist it is because racism is an “American sin.” In other words, liberalism is never wrong. I could go on at length about this." . . .

Washington's Redskin

. . . Martin Luther King dreamed of a day when men would be judged not on the color of their skin but on the content of their great-great-great-grandmother's wedding-license application. And now it's here! . . .

A copy of Pow Wow Chow signed by the authentic fake Cherokee
herself, Elizabeth Warren

Mark Steyn  "The other day President Trump referred jokingly, yet again, to Senator Elizabeth Warren as "Pocahontas", and as a result is even more totally racey-racey-racist than he was the week before. If you're finding this all a bit hard to follow, relax:

If a white grade-school teacher pretends to be black, that's totally racist and you should denounce him as such immediately;

But if a white professor pretends to be Harvard Law School's "first woman of color" and you point it out, then you're the racist.

"Got that? It's easy when you know how:

If a Victoria's Secret model wears lingerie "inspired by indigenous African cultures", that's cultural appropriation;

But if a white Harvard professor takes up valuable space in an authentic tribal cookbook, that's not cultural appropriation ...er, because the authentic tribal recipes she submitted turned out to come from the Duke of Windsor's favorite restaurant.

. . .

. . .  "But she could be 1/32nd Cherokee, and maybe get invited to a luncheon with others of her kind—"people who are like I am," 31/32nds white, and they can all sit around celebrating their diversity together." . . . 

From Comedian Argus Hamilton:

President Trump razzed Elizabeth Warren Monday, calling her Pocahantas because she once lied she was Cherokee to get on the Harvard faculty. She’s thin-skinned. If Elizabeth Warren is ever elected president, how angry will she be at the Marine Band every time they play Hail to the Chief? 

 Cherokee Woman Slams Warren For Using ‘Racist Stereotypes’ To Claim She’s Native American

Amber Randall

. . . “She was not a hero to me when she failed to foster a haven of support for Native students within Harvard University’s alienating Ivy League culture. She is not a hero for spending years awkwardly avoiding Native leaders. She is not a hero because, despite claiming to be the only Native woman in the U.S. Senate, she has done nothing to advance our rights,” Nagle said. “She is not from us. She does not represent us. She is not Cherokee.” 

Hey, Colin: Do Your Knees Hurt Yet?

NFL Surrenders

Eileen F. Toplansky  . . . "This means ISIS is involved in the slavery industry in a European country."  Moreover, does Kaepernick know that black Africans owning other black Africans has existed in Mauritania for generations and continues to this day?

"Has he ever read the searing accounts by North Koreans describing the misery of life in that totalitarian regime?  Do his football buddies shed tears for the murderof North Koreans who defect and are shot by their own government, as happened the other day?  When these helmeted athletes speak of injustice, do the namesFarzana Iqbal and Samia Imran come to mind?  These Pakistani women were "honor-killed" by members of their own family because they dared to marry men of their own choosing." . . .

Weasel Zippers sees the mob coming with pitchforks and torches

Morning Clown Joe Scarborough Accuses Trump Of Being Mentally Ill, Calls On Cabinet To Remove Him From Office…

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  The War Planner • 

  
  

  I check the document below and cannot seem to find anywhere a provision for THE CABINET to remove the President. Am I missing something? (Comment in the above post)

Lib Rag Newsweek: Trump Could Be Impeached For “Slurring” Elizabeth Warren As “Pocahontas”…

. . . "Trump’s comment does not rise to the level of the accusations against Johnson, a Democrat thrust into battle with a Republican-controlled Congress following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. While it would not be enough on its own to qualify as a case for impeachment, said Allan Lichtman, a political historian at American University, it could bolster the case against Trump.
“ 'That could be a part of an article of impeachment,” Lichtman, the author of a book on Trump titled The Case for Impeachment, told Newsweek Tuesday. “After all, you could couple that with his very intemperate attacks on the judiciary. Combine that with his attacks on the free press. You could couple all of that together and create a fairly powerful article of impeachment.' ”

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to pay $22.3 million to lease building owned by Obama bundler

Washington Examiner for full article.

The attempted CFPB coup

. . . Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., writing in the Wall Street Journal, November 29, called attention to one artful method employed by the agency: fabricating "evidence of racial disparity in auto lending to shake money out of lenders."  Jenkins noted that the agency had no authority to go after auto dealers and so put pressure on banks instead.  Jenkins referred to the appointment of English as acting director as a "power grab of the [Elizabeth] Warren junta."  Thus far, Judge Kelly has stymied this "power grab."

This May Explain Why Democrats Are So Desperate To Hang Onto Control Of CFPB

"A President has the power of appointment over agencies like the Consumer Fraud Protection Bureau. That’s why when Democrats tried to perform a coup and hold onto power there, it seemed rather odd. 
"But perhaps it’s not so strange if they’re trying to cover up things or keep their pay-for-play in motion.
"Check out this article from 2014. They were paying $22.3. million for two years for ‘temporary space’ for the bureau at a building owned by a big Democratic donor/Obama bundler. And we also paid millions extra, triple the amount estimated for ‘renovations’ to the building.
"What else might a new director discover?

"Via Washington Examiner:

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau officials will pay $22.3 million to lease temporary offices in addition to the record-breaking $145 million being spent to renovate the agency’s headquarters, according to documents obtained by the Washington Examiner.

The temporary offices to be occupied by CFPB for the next two years are being leased in a building owned by Neil G. Bluhm, a longtime friend and campaign bundler for President Obama.

Bluhm made headlines in 2010 when he hosted Obama’s 49th birthday party at his Chicago home. Admission was $30,000 per person, with the proceeds going to the Democratic National Committee.

Controversy has dogged the CFPB for more than a year for nearly tripling the initial $55 million cost estimate for renovations to the building that will serve as the bureau’s permanent headquarters. The building is across the street from the White House, at 1700 G St. NW in Washington.

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