On Hillary

Hillary’s Bad Week  "The presumed 2016 candidate has bounced boisterously from gaffe to gaffe."

 

Hillary: Russian Reset 'A Brilliant Stroke'  " In an interview to promote her book on BBC, Hillary Clinton called the Russian so-called reset "a brilliant stroke." The statement came in response to a question about whether she was in retrospect embarrassed about the policy." 

 

Hillary Clinton: Taliban Five Not a Threat to U.S.  ... "Adopting Mrs. Clinton’s own reasoning, I don’t see the, shall we say, remarkable judgment she exhibited at the State Department as a threat to her presidential ambitions, not at all."

President Obama Wasted American Victory and Lost Iraq: What Now?

NRO   "This is what happens when a president declares an end to a war that wasn’t truly over."
...
"What now? Obviously we cannot return in force on the ground. The American people simply would not abide it. But we’re not helpless and can at least take action to prevent total disaster. I suggest five steps:"
1. Provide air support if necessary to protect the Kurds, our most faithful Iraqi allies for more than a generation. If we allow the Kurds to be swallowed up in the fighting, we’ll send a disastrous message to all our close allies that we are utterly faithless — that indeed our friendship is deadly....
 
2. Condition any direct military support for the Maliki government on the removal of Iranian forces from the country. The United States Air Force must not become close air support for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, thereby using American air power to turn southern Iraq into a virtual Iranian province. There are reports of thousands of Shiite fighters rallying to defend Baghdad, and it’s possible that they’ll be able to at least stabilize the front. If they can’t — and if they’re Iraqi and not Iranian — we should consider American strikes to keep the capital from falling.
 
3. Defend our embassy.... Jihad thrives on victory, and the image of occupying the American embassy would lift the Sunni radicals far more than any victory thus far.
 
4. Demand an overhaul of the Obama national-security team. That team — including of course Susan Rice and the hapless secretary of defense — is completely out of its depth. ...We have to replace the political hacks with warriors, or the war will come home once again.
 
5. Educate the American people. This is perhaps the most difficult task. The American people have to understand that the violence sweeping the Middle East has direct implications for our own security. The jihadists fighting each other are doing so only as a prelude to taking on the real enemy — the United States. A “Fortress America” approach can keep out large groups of terrorists, but it doesn’t take large groups to wreak havoc. We have to demonstrate to our citizens that the Obama Doctrine of withdrawal and defeat is the pathway to genocide abroad and violence at home. It may be too late for Iraq, but it’s not too late for Afghanistan. Total withdrawal there will likely yield similar results. 

Lois Lerner and the corruption of this third-world government

A dog ate 2 years of Lois Lerner’s emails. Now what?  "So the IRS suffered a catastrophic hard disk failure and, lo and behold! two years of Lois Lerner’s emails have vanished: poof! Just like that. Imagine. Evidence of those happy days targeting conservative groups, gone. So much for the memoir. Eliana Johnson reports that Dave Camp, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, is really steamed. He has even asked the Justice Department to look into it.  “The fact that I am just learning about this, over a year into the investigation, is completely unacceptable and now calls into question the credibility of the IRS’s response to congressional inquiries,” he said in a statement. “There needs to be an immediate investigation and forensic audit by Department of Justice as well as the Inspector General.”

"Still laughing? Yes, that would be Eric Holder’s Justice Department.  Don’t hold your breath, Mr. Camp."

Andrew C. McCarthy:  Lois Lerner’s ‘Lost’ Emails
"When will this president finally have to answer for the executive-branch lawlessness that is an everyday occurrence on his watch?"



 

House Ways and Means Commitee chairman Dave Camp has hit a roadblock in his investigation of the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative groups: The IRS says it has lost over two years’ worth of e-mails sent by former agency official Lois Lerner, the one of the chief subjects of the committee’s investigation.

Iraq before Obama. The Obama administration tells us how much better it was by 2012 thanks to Obama

Power Line   ...

"When we arrived in November 2007, in Diyala Province (labeled the Islamic Caliphate of Iraq by the al-Qaeda forces in control) every time any convoy rolled out of the gate, it had a greater than 25 percent chance of enemy contact — IEDs, ambushes, or sniper fire. When we left in late September 2008, that chance was down to approximately 1 percent."

... "Fortunately, our presidents, both Republican and Democrat, preserved our hard-won success in South Korea. It wasn’t the easy thing to do, but it was the right thing.

"President Obama opted for the easy thing. In doing so, he has given away what brave Americans gave their life to win.

"Indeed, Obama has disserved our Iraq War veterans both coming and going. Barring a reversal in Iraq, he has rendered their sacrifices a virtual nullity and he has failed to provide so many of them with the health care they were promised."

 "What a guy."  Full article.

Obama Campaign 2012: President Obama Responsibly Ended The War In Iraq   "It’s Friday the 13th and there’s a full moon tonight. I think we all deserve a good laugh to keep our minds off of the impending werewolf attacks. I came across a list of accomplishments on barackobama.com from Halloween 2012, just prior to the election, and it is a side-splitter.

"There’s plenty of horn-tooting about all of the jobs Obama claims to have created and tax cuts he pretends exist, but the real comedy lies further down the list:

                27. President Obama responsibly ended the war in Iraq.

Then there is this one:

28. He announced a plan to end the war in Afghanistan and transition security responsibility to the Afghan people.

Another testimony to the honor and integrity of this president who was the darling of Hollywood, academia, the media, and all low-information voters everywhere:

31. Through the President’s historic increases in Veterans Affairs funding, he has expanded and improved healthcare and job training access for our returning veterans.

 

Obama Quits Afghanistan

"Bringing Bergdahl home was useful for closing Gitmo and winding down the war."

Victor Davis Hanson

 

... "The president wants to quit the war, whether Afghanistan is subsequently lost to the Taliban or not. He wishes to close Guantanamo, as he promised in 2008, regardless of a law that demands congressional approval to release detainees, and despite the dangers incurred by the release of terrorists. Bringing Bergdahl home is part of sporadic negotiations with the Taliban about easing Americans out of the war, and also useful for closing down Guantanamo.

 

"Obama is wagering that the public does not care all that much whether Bergdahl is a deserter. Or whether the administration has negotiated with terrorists such as the Haqqani network or the Taliban. Or whether the released Taliban militants will soon return to fight in Afghanistan.

 

"Obama is also betting that Americans are sick of Afghanistan, and don’t really care how American soldiers leave or what they leave behind, as long as they all leave.

 

"We saw that in Iraq in 2011, and we are seeing it again as a backdrop to the Bergdahl swap." 

 

Is it just me, or do we see Barack Obama simply referred to as "Obama" and not as "President Obama"

The Hubris and Incompetence of Barack Obama

Blackfive

 

"Leadership is hard.  Harry Truman wasn’t the best president ever, but at least he knew his job.

"When it came time to decide in 1945 after the Potsdam Declaration, "Bomb or No bomb," he made the call and did the right thing, which was a very hard thing.  When General MacArthur and he began to have significant differences of opinion on policy and operational conduct, he did the hard thing and relieved MacArthur.  In both of these cases, he dealt with extraordinary pressures and demands and through it all, still made a decision.

"Contrast that with what comes from the Occupant in Chief; lots and lots of "I just learned about this the same time you did" followed generally by "It was/wasn't a youtube video"  "It was (insert policy maker/leaders' name here) decision"  followed closely by not doing anything of significance or involving competence and then pivoting to solving the student loan crisis." 
This next is going to hurt:

My guess is that Barack is going to say he learned about all of this Al-Qaeda movement from the media.  At least, that will be his excuse.  Might be a good one, since he doesn't attend his daily briefings. 

Ouch. Told you so.
 More...

Obama Versus America

Power Line  ... "So where was the media outrage when President Obama chewed gum during the D-Day ceremony in Normandy last week?  It seems to have been confined to the Washington Times and the Twitterverse.   E.J. Dionne was on hand to argue that it was probably Nicorette, so it’s
okay—Obama is still struggling nobly to break his cigarette habit.  No disrespect intended!  (But really—can anyone imagine Ronald Reagan, or either Bush, chewing gum at a memorial service for our armed forces?)

"I doubt this was entirely an accident or uncontrollable impulse on Obama’s part.  It fits with his general contempt for—and rejection of—America’s traditions.  He never does this quite openly.  It is always through subtle little gestures, like bowing to foreign potentates.  Occasionally he gives out more significant markers." ... Full article.

Priorities

Legal Insurrection

Cartoonist A.F.Branco
 

Will America Ever Be Forgiven For Slavery?

Question, please:  If we today are guilty of the slave trade of two centuries ago, and today's African-Americans deserve reparations for that, then aren't today's Democrats guilty of the Ku Klux Klan's violence? The Tunnel Dweller

Patricia L. Dickson ... "I have listened to the counter arguments presented by my fellow black Americans as to which slave owners where the worst (although there is no way to prove any of it) and I have come to this conclusion. In the words of Hillary Rodham Clinton, “what difference, at this point, does it make?” Does it not matter that an estimated 700,000 lives were lost fighting the Civil War to end slavery? What can Liberals and race baiters hope to gain by constantly throwing slavery in the midst of every discussion?  Finally, if a Holy God can forgive sinful man for his past sins, how is it that sinful man can never forgive other sinful men for past sins?  Will America every be forgiven for its role in slavery?  Patricia's corner

 

Unsung heroes flew to Libya for Benghazi survivors, victims (Updated)

First Benghazi whistleblower emerges   "President Obama is poised to reap a whirlwind of consequences for his conduct of the war on terror. Iraq is falling into the hands of the enemy President Bush had defeated on the battlefield. The fact that the Obama administration lied to the American people about the Benghazi attack in order to smooth his re-election makes his failures in conducting the affairs of state not merely a matter of incompetence or honest mistakes but actual venality."
"A new report makes these consequences closer to reality."

The untold story of Maj. Eric Stahl and his US Air Force crew.
"What's up with that video?"
"I have no idea"
The attackers used State Department cell phones to take orders from higher-ups. We hear the description of how both the American bodies were loaded on their plane and how the attackers got on their escape plane.

US spy agencies heard Benghazi attackers using State Dept. cell phones to call terrorist leaders   ... "The disclosure is important because it adds to the body of evidence establishing that senior U.S. officials in the Obama administration knew early on that Benghazi was a terrorist attack, and not a spontaneous protest over an anti-Islam video that had gone awry, as the administration claimed for several weeks after the attacks." ...

 

EPIC – Trey Gowdy gets a standing ovation on House Floor ‘

The Absurd Report 

 

Hat tip to iOwnTheWorld.com

On the "Cantor Calamity" and immigration

More Cantor fallout: What happens to Obama’s executive order on deportations now?  ... "He’s done next to nothing for liberal amnesty fans since then. If he runs away in terror at the sight of Cantor getting blown out of the water, some of them might boycott the midterms, and suddenly the GOP’s looking at an even bigger night than everyone expects. He’s got to act.

"So, when? When is the least damaging moment politically for Obama to make this now inevitable move? My best guess is that he’s going to stick to the original timeline of doing it during the August recess. " ...

Comprehensive Defeat 

 

"A lot of Republicans, disproportionately those in Washington, D.C., harbor the fantasy that the party could make great gains among Hispanic voters if it would only offer legal status to millions of illegal immigrants, create large guest-worker programs, and refrain from insisting that enforcement of the existing laws be shown to work before taking these steps. Cantor refused to shut the door on this approach, so primary voters shut the door on him."

 

Brat’s Victory Means Re-evaluation Time for the GOP   " Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, who embraces a more welcoming immigration policy than does much of the Republican nominating electorate, may construe Cantor’s defeat as a discouraging augury concerning any presidential aspirations Bush might have."

Did Democratic Meddling Defeat Eric Cantor?   "Dave Brat's stunning victory over House majority leader Eric Cantor is being hailed as a huge win for the Tea Party and immigration hawks, but might Brat actually owe his victory to Democrats, who were eligible to vote in Tuesday's open primary? That's a question Republican strategist Patrick Ruffini raised late last night on Twitter, where he pointed out that Brat performed very well in districts where Obama did best in 2012:: ...  In other words, was Brat the Democrat's choice?

‘Amnesty’ Has Claimed a Victim   ... "To critics of immigration reform, the defeat of Cantor reflects a growing wave of opposition to congressional action on immigration, particularly anything resembling the Senate-passed measure that offers a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants here.

 

"But if a wave exists, there was no evidence of it in the Republican primary in South Carolina won by Senator Lindsey Graham, a co-sponsor of the Senate bill and an outspoken advocate of letting illegals stay in the U.S.  Graham got four or five times as many votes as Brat."