Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden

The Washington Post reports that Leon “Coast-to-coast” Panetta heard a very optimistic report from officials in Kabul today in regards to our situation in Afghanistan. Marine Major General Lawrence Nicholson, the head of operations for the coalition in Afghanistan told him that US forces are doing a “minimum” of the work for Afghans – that US forces are “unpartnering” from operations.

The assessment Nicholson offered, however, is far rosier than the one that U.S. officials have provided recently. They have been citing the resilience of the Taliban and the shortcomings of the Afghan government and military.

Just one of 23 Afghan army brigades is able to operate on its own without air or other military support from the United States or NATO, according to a Pentagon report to Congress that was released Monday.

Nicholson said that although U.S. commanders have made “disingenuous” claims in the past about the extent to which Afghans were acting as equal partners in joint missions, officials now see the Afghan army as ready to operate largely on its own, albeit with key logistical and financial support from NATO.

Imagine that. The situation has changed 180 degrees from the report released to Congress on Monday. So, I guess it’s getting close to time for rushing to exit. Of course, since the generals got the firm word that all combat forces will be withdrawn in two years, that assumption was highlighted by the election results, what else would they be briefing now?

And, oh, the Washington Times reports that after Panetta left Ali Al Salem Air Base before getting the briefing in Kabul, a suicide bomber took out a US soldier and two Afghans at the base gate. A punctuation mark for the report, I suppose.

The Taliban are a small but resilient force, even after 11 years of fighting a vastly larger U.S.-led international force. They managed to send a dramatic reminder Thursday, claiming credit for the suicide bombing that killed three and wounded 17 near an entrance to Kandahar Air Field, the largest Western base in southern Afghanistan. Panetta and his traveling party had left the air field about two hours before the attack.

Of course, nothing can reverse the withdrawal schedule at this point. Remember that we promised the South Vietnamese that we’d return combat troops there if the North Vietnamese invaded the south. Instead we got the iconic pictures of a frantic evacuation of the embassy and equipment being shoved into the ocean.

I’ve said before that I know someone who is stationed at Landstuhl Hospital in Germany and was in the operation room when casualties from the attack on the consulate in Benghazi arrived there from Libya. This person told me that there were more than 30 casualties that day and the staff at the hospital was pretty busy.

Now, according to Breitbart, Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz claims that the Obama Administration is hiding those folks;

…he has been “thwarted” by the State Department from seeing any Americans who survived the deadly attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi. Many people forget that there were Americans who survived the Benghazi attack, some of whom were badly injured and are still recovering.

“My understanding is that we still have some people in the hospital. I’d like to visit with them and wish them nothing but the best but the State Department has seen it unfit for me to know who those people are—or even how many there are,” Rep. Chaffetz said. “I don’t know who they are. I don’t know where they live. I don’t know what state they’re from. I don’t even know how many there are. It doesn’t seem right to me.”

It seems to me that some of those folks would have some insight into the events of that day which we haven’t heard yet.

Jerry920 sends a link to Fox News which recounts the story of the US buying twenty F1-6 jets for the Muslim Brotherhood…er…Egypt which will be delivered in the new year;

The U.S. government ordered and paid for the fighter jets for Egypt’s military as part of foreign aid for Egypt back in 2010, when Hosni Mubarak ruled. The fighter jets were supposed to be delivered in 2013, and delivery will go ahead as scheduled even though Hosni Mubarak has been removed from power and replaced by Mohamed Morsi, who led the Muslim Brotherhood before becoming Egypt’s president.

Well, that makes perfect sense to me. Riots in the streets, Hamas getting their resupplies from Iran through Egypt and now we’re going to give them 20 jets. At a cost of about a billion bucks. Maybe we can give marksmanship training to the Taliban, too.

Our buddy, Denise Williams at Chicago Now, writes to tell us that the Iraqi immigrant, Abdullatif Ali Aldosary, who bombed the Social Security office in Casa Grande, Arizona isn’t being charged as a domestic terrorist. The charges according to Associated Press are “maliciously damaging federal property by means of explosives and being a felon in possession of a firearm.”

Tucson News Now makes this ironic statement about the case;

FBI agents believe they have the man responsible for bombing the Social Security building in Casa Grande and according to court documents, the explosives used are similar to the ones in many bomb plots including terrorist attacks.

So, even though his bomb was just like bombs used in terrorist attacks, his wasn’t a terrorist attack?

Nidal Hasan’s murder of 14 Americans at Fort Hood isn’t terrorism, Carlos Bledsoe’s (aka Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad) murder of an American soldier in Little Rock isn’t terrorism and now a bombing of a federal building in Arizona isn’t terrorism.

But here’s some domestic terrorism;

Martin S. Kimber of Ruby, N.Y., pleaded guilty to two counts of using chemical weapons and a third for consumer-product tampering in a federal courtroom in Albany, for leaving mercury three times in 2011 and once in 2012 in the Albany Medical Center’s hospital men’s bathroom, the emergency department, on a pedestrian ramp and in the cafeteria in a cooler, fruit bowls, salad bar and toasters.

Here’s some more – Canadian terrorist;

Rebecca Rubin, 39, turned herself in to U.S. authorities at the border in Blaine, Wash., on Thursday after working out a plea agreement for her part in a series of spectacular arsons more than a decade ago.

According to the FBI, the Canadian citizen was one of more than a dozen members of a cell of the Earth Liberation Front, a radical group that firebombed businesses and government buildings across five U.S. states in the name of defending the environment.

Remember the plot to blow up a bridge near Cleveland? All spoiled white brats, but domestic terrorists.

There was Andrew Joseph Stack who flew his light plane into the IRS building in Austin, TX in 2010 – he was a domestic terrorist.

So, apparently, any act that is committed by those of the Islamic faith isn’t terrorism to this administration.

Fox News reports that the Syrian government has started moving it’s chemical weapons – you know, the chemical weapons that appeared in Syria out of thin air in 2003.

One senior U.S. official told Fox News “there are concerns about possible preparations for use” of the weapons, though “we don’t know yet if they plan to use them.”

The official added, “There are troubling signs of late.”

[…]

[White House Press Secretary Jay] Carney said using or proliferating those weapons “would cross a red line for the United States.”

“They will be held accountable by the United States and the international community if they use chemical weapons or fail to meet their obligation to secure them.”

Carney would not say whether the movement of weapons by itself could cross the so-called red line.

Clinton, in Prague for meetings with Czech officials, also reiterated President Obama’s declaration that Syrian action on chemical weapons was a “red line” for the United States that would prompt action.

I’m pretty sure that those strongly worded statements aren’t going to convince the Syrians to not use the weapons if they’ve already made up their minds. I guess this is one thing he can’t use the drones to handle the problem.

So, what are they going to do? Oh, yeah, that’s right, they said last month that they’d need 75,000 troops to secure those weapons. So, do you guys have your bags packed for the next time you’re going to have to make Obama look good?

The Associated Press reports that yesterday the Senate voted 62-33 to end our participation in the war in Afghanistan earlier than the Obama Administration planned for the end of 2014;

Although the vote was on a nonbinding amendment to a defense policy bill, its significance could not be discounted amid the current discussions.

Thirteen Republicans, including Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, the top GOP lawmaker on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, backed the measure.

Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., its chief sponsor, argued that al-Qaida is stronger in other parts of the world and that nation-building in Afghanistan has gone off track.

At this point, I have to agree somewhat. The Obama Administration has no intention of bringing the necessary pain to al Qaeda or the Taliban. The Afghans themselves seem perfectly content to let the Taliban take the country back. No one seems committed to winning the war against terror except the troops who are sacrificing themselves at a higher rate there than ever before.

The Obama strategy seems to be only to give the impression that we’re involved, what with adopting the robot ninja zombie strategy of Joe Bite-Me which is only one degree better than the Clinton cruise missile solution to his terrorist problems.

The sooner we can pull our troops out, the sooner they can stop dying to give the public impression that this administration wants to fight terror.