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Did you ever walk into the middle of a scandal brewing? Perhaps at work, or your church, or social club you frequent to get time away from your spouse? You had no clue walking in that anything had happened, and the business meeting to censure someone is underway….
You get told… “oh, it’s terrible. It’s the end of the world, We have to do something. Why have they not done something yet?”
And you are going… “Really? What’s going on? Someone fill me in. What started it? Why is this so bad? What really happened? Why do we have to get a new boss?”
Sort of like walking into the Monica Lewenski scandal midway, and going,…. what? You’re impeaching the best President of the United States we’ve ever had, …. over a relationship?
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So can someone fill me in as to why this Veteran’s controversy is so bad? It is not like it is news. We’ve known this, since forever. The demand has always been greater than the supply. In fact, this leader whose head we are calling for, has moved the department competitently forward during difficult times.
Perhaps perspective is called for?
Did we fire the head of JP Morgan for the London Whale disaster? Both are still working for JP Morgan, aren’t they? Did the head of BP resign or get fired? I don’t think so. Is Freedom Enterprises still intact after spoiling the drinking water of all of civilized West Virginia? Why yes, it is..
So what was so bad at the Veteran’s administration, that is so horrible, so abysmal, that it trumps the theft or loss of $2 billion dollars, or a gigantic oil spill ruining miles of 5 state’s Gulf Coasts, or toxic licorice smelling chemicals infesting the tap water of a entire state’s largest two cities?
Waiting lists.
Oh… waiting lists?
Yes… it it terrible, tragic, horrible, that due to insufficient space, veterans were put on waiting lists….
Uhh….. Ok.
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Is there anyone out there who can explain why this waiting list thing is so bad, why it is being called a terrible scandal? One necessitating the firing of the Secretary in charge of the Department? Why is this not being treated as was Abu Ghraib , which was just some rogue soldiers messing around that certainly didn’t require chopping off the head of the Department of Defense? What was his name back then? Oh yeah… Donald Rumsfeld.
Especially since the only person who can fix the Veteran’s Administration in a timely fashion, is the very person Republicans are calling upon to be fired?
So please…. inform me. Otherwise just stepping into this and trying to grasp what is going on, looks just like an exercise, similar to Benghazi….. of watching people trying to make a GIGANTIC scandal out of one pea missing out of sequence from an unopened pea pod……
Isn’t the real scandal, seriously, one about the incompetence of these people shouting: its a major scandal?
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Sheesh. And people ask why no one cares about politics anymore? Now, Lindsey Lohan? …. there’s a real scandal….
Photo courtesy of the EPA.
That would be my advice. Truth is, we quickly make Russia into a demon. They do the same to us. If there is anything we have learned over 100 years since the Great War started in August 1914, it is that going to war, should be the last resort…
Back in the early ’90’s upon being given the privilege to look over the Soviet’s intelligence when Communism fell, we were shocked that all their aggressive actions were seen in their eyes as defensive moves against possible aggression being planned by us….It is best represented by a young officers story from the cold war. I’ve long forgotten the source, if it comes up later I’ll tag it in…
But a young officer was in charge of a section of the German fence, and on his first shift, received a request for orders and told the reconnaissance brigade to go 5 more miles along the fence past where they usually turned around. They called back to say they’d stumbled on fresh movement of troops being maneuvered to that gap on front line we never had bothered to inspect.. After finding our troops were now outnumbered by their new response, this young officer ordered another brigade to move up from the south. That brigade also discovered another large number of troops moving in from the eastern reserves to that same point… The officer began to sweat. Was he witnessing on his watch, in his territory, the beginning of the long-feared invasion of Western Europe by the Soviets? He called up two more brigades and ordered them to dig in around that point. The Soviets brought up tanks, and lined them up for an invasion… The young officer then picked up the phone… Far away, the head of command looked over all the evidence… Finally he gave this advice… Pull your troops out, by ten miles…. he did, and the Soviets pulled theirs back as well. Ok, came the next order. Resume normalcy. And soon, everything again was routine….
For those that don’t understand war, the point of the story was, that the young officer caused the crises. The whole Russian buildup, was because of him. He made a move the Russians didn’t understand, and since they didn’t understand, they prepared for an attack. As we brought up more, so did they. They were simply matching our moves… Fortunately someone wise enough to understand that he Russians really didn’t want to go to war, stepped in and averted a possible WWIII start-up incident…
As if on cue, already dumb John McCain is rattling swords and demanding we nuke Moscow. Soon Lindsey Graham will follow as Tweedle Dumb always follows Tweedle Dee… Likewise, Putin will also have his exact same crowd (probably riding Harleys), his group of idiots, clamoring for war as well…
The Western press has already begin its war talk, leading with the condemnation of the Russian Government… But really, isn’t that a bit premature? No one has died. Far less than anything that happened in Kiev earlier this week….
Let’s wear Putin’s shoes for moment….
What if the predominantly Mexican population of San Diego wanted to be aligned with Mexico instead of the USA, all because we couldn’t get Republicans to pass immigration laws.. What if they gathered en masse in San Diego to protest, stayed, burned down government and private buildings. What if we tried to make them stand down, and it roused up even more Mexicans to their defense. What if the Mayor fled to Yuma, and camped out in a sanatorium. … …
What would the US do. OUR entire Pacific Fleet rests in San Diego… We would probably act prudently. and move outward to expand our perimeter. We would probably commander all airports and ship docks in that area in order to be able to land reinforcements if necessary. We would probably park a couple of gunboats facing the city as an intimidating force reminding the Mexicans we had forces they couldn’t get to, so their behavior should keep that in mind. We’d probably block access roads leading into the port, so an invasion army wouldn’t be able to charge in unannounced…
Just to play devils advocate, what might happen if we took no action to defend ourselves? As most Americans are asking the Russians to do? We saw the Mexicans had little respect in town for law and order. There are a lot more of them than there are of us… What if 10,000 of them just walked on to the base, armed with shotguns, hunting rifles, and a few semi automatics. What if they boarded all our ships, our subs, and put our sailors at gunpoint into the brig, and announced they were in charge of the Baja Mexican Navy… Now the 2nd largest navy in the world. What would the US do? Would we sail into our own harbor as did the Free French and blow what used to be our own ships up out of the water?
Of course the Mexicans would say we are invading their new country. Of course every Spanish tonged nation South of our border would be condemning us for invading Mexican California… despite the fact that a lot of gringos, maybe even a majority, live around San Diego and support our American troops being there and keeping the masses of Mexicans from turning on them….
Point is, we would ourselves, do what Russia just did...
So how can we condemn them, when we have contingency plans to do exactly the same thing?
There is further evidence this is not like Sudetenland, . One, no one has died. It was a smooth peaceful quiet takeover, textbook by American Standards. Two, action is isolated to the port and Crimea. Three, all evidence points to these actions solely for the purpose of controlling access to the base.
As Americans we would laugh at Europe, Russia, and China telling us to abandon San Diego. There are a lot of similarities between that and the Russian base. The number one move now appears to be: for the Kiev Ukraine government to insist that the base will forever stay Russian, and guarantee the safety of all Russians living on Crimea… Second, it should state that the current administration insists there will be no change for those who like having Russians close by. For that select group, there will be only two options. Life goes either goes on the same; or it gets better. The third option that it may get worse, is forever off the table.. .
It would be the equivalent of that American young officer calling off his men, and telling them to retreat backwards 10 miles.. it would be the opposite of what happened 100 years ago, where threats begot threats and soon rigid plans took effect and not one leader had the chutzpah to stop it from going forward. 6 million soldiers died, 15 million civilians died, and a whole generation of young men was wiped out. Girls had to marry men their father’s age.. and in the end Western Europe’s borders were right back where they were before the whole event started.
Cool heads must prevail. Of course the McCains will spout off. They don’t matter. What matters is that we treat the Russians with respect just as we would like them to do for us, if the shoe were on the other foot and we were fighting the battle of San Diego…..
“If you deprive the military of the ability to train, the ability to have flight hours for our pilots and air crews, the ability of our people to have the right kind of equipment to fight with, then you are putting us in danger in my view,” John McCain said.
Here is a clip of McCain speaking with Lindsey Graham alongside, correctly assessing the harm the sequestration will cause our armed forces… No repairs? Mothball fleets? 20% pay cuts for all military personnel? What will that do to morale?
So, dude, why didn’t you do anything to stop it?
All you had to do was vote for an additional tax of one single penny on every dollar earned over $1 million…..
This sequester then would never have happened? Why did you singlehandedly cause this sequestration by your own inaction, when you and your party could have so easily prevented it?
And then you go on television to say it is really bad? America is looking at you like you are the dumbest person alive….
Donald Trump has a small penis. (His overcompensation gives it away). He wants America to appreciate small things. And most importantly, he wants to use his massive amounts of money make others do so, even if by funding a candidate up to the $200 million dollar level now that there is no limit….
Senator Ted Cruz envisions himself as President some day. He will need money…. Lots of money. His own supporters (the former Tea Party) are poor. The wealthy in his state do not like him so he can’t count on Texas. He will need a big donor when he makes his run.
Dick Durbin is up before Ted Cruz as a candidate for the President’s Secretary of Defense. “Dick” Durbin is rumored to have a big dick because his wife is always smiling.
Ted knows, that if he is very hard on Mr Big, (Dick Durbin) he will catch the eye of Donald Trump. If he stymies Mr Big (Dick Durbin) he will get noticed even more. Furthermore, Ted Cruz also knows some of his party compatriots, also have hard-ons for the presidency, and they also are planning on being anti-Big to get Donald’s eyes as well.
Ted Cruz knows he has to be the biggest, baddest, Dick (Durbin) basher on the committee, if he wants Donald Trump to fund him through out the primaries, instead of another suitor….
Every Republican Senator tries to one-up the other when it comes to bashing Dick, and that, explains the irrationality of the entire hearing, the filibuster, and the vote.
The behavior was certainly irrational if one considers the state of the country, the lost election, the armed forces, the sequestration, the upcoming NATO meeting on the future of Afghanistan. But it very rational, very rational indeed if you have no money and are looking for a Sugar Daddy to spread apart, open up your path into the Presidency….
Now.
Substitute Adelson, Israel, Chuck Hagel, and you finally have an idea of what was going on with the Chuck Hagel hearing and vote.
With just ten minutes left for one Senator to possibly scramble upstairs and cast a vote that would not change the outcome, Chuck Hagel’s secretary of defense nomination was sent to the Floor….
One of the more surprising moments was the very Senatorial response given by Mazie Hirono, the replacement for Dan Inouye, who passed away after the election.
In a brief statement she noted (at exactly the 2:00 mark) that the national security need for an immediate Secretary of Defense was necessary, and to abort the process and begin anew was irresponsible, for with sequestration, budget reductions, downsizing after Afghanistan, re-pivoting to the Pacific, challenges of North Korea, Syria, North Africa, cyber attacks to our data systems, power grid, infrastructure, all requiring immediate attention. Chuck Hagel exemplified himself in war, as a CEO, and in the chambers of the Senate itself. That puts him as equally qualified as anyone else in that room. Simply put, we need someone now, this man is capable, he has my vote.
Courtesy of C Span
I guess she hasn’t learned to be long winded yet.
Which brings up the Republicans… What on earth is wrong with them? Are they nuts?
Every unbiased report confirms they are nuts.
Republican foreign policy is farce, not even worthy of Shakespeare.
So Republicans have decided that Afghanistan doesn’t exist. At last summer’s Republican National Convention, Mitt Romney never mentioned the Afghan War (that was left up to Clint Eastwood).
Drones, Zero mentions.
Cyber warfare, two came from Committee Republicans..
China, only one mention came from a Senate Republican. (and that occured when Texas Sen. Ted Cruz asked Hagel if he had traveled to China with Chas Freeman, a former American diplomat known for critical views toward, you guessed it, Israel.)
Israel (178 Republican mentions)
America must help Israel prevent the development of Iran’s nuclear weapon. (171 mentions)
The GOP campaign against him has descended even deeper into triviality. Republicans on the Armed Services Committee are now refusing to vote on Hagel’s nomination until he provides evidence that no organization he was affiliated with received foreign funding over the past decade? WTF? Every Republican on that committed gets foreign political funding from AIPAC….
His answer: no.
Republicans stoop even lower.
Republicans are demanding that he prove that no company or non-profit he has been involved in has received any foreign funding either!
Chuck Hagel’s answer? “That information…is legally controlled by the individual entities and not mine to disclose.”
This is “unprecedented,” as well as “ridiculous and outrageous,” especially since there’s zero evidence that Hagel—a decorated Vietnam veteran—has ever subverted the interests of the United States in service of a foreign power.
One senses Chuck Hagel’s ridiculous farcical hearing process, brought to its knees by these Republicans, has not one iota of relevance to Mr. Hagel’s qualifications, and every bit of relevancy to fending off a potential evangelical Tea Party primary challenger chomping for a run against these Republicans in the next election season….
- In case you are waking up, you won’t get this story until noon.
The Daily Mail London just opened a can of worms on Benghazi….
Breaking News: The Daily Mail is reporting from inside sources that General Petreaus and the Ambassador Stevens were not informed that parts of the CIA had one day before, attacked the very same group of Libyan insurgents who returned the next day to attack at Benghazi. Furthermore, the Petreaus scandal was orchestrated by a rogue element of the CIA itself(7th floor) who were the ones behind the pushing of the FBI into investigating General Petreaus bedside manners.. (remember that fishiness of how the rogue FBI agent kept pushing his superiors? It makes sense now.)
Now get this. The same John Brennan who just testified to become the next CIA director, was who ordered the clandestine attacks the night before and who did not brief Petreaus, or the official side of the CIA, that they had done so.
So not only are Republicans completely wrong on Benghazi, they are now laughingstocks for every single word they said about it….
- We did know about the security threat.
- We did do something about it.
- We didn’t tell Obama, Clinton, Panetta, or Petreaus.
- All were in the dark, not to propagate deceit, but because they had no idea….
Every Republican needs to apologize to every Democrat starting now by getting down on their knees, and bowing their head to the ground in supplication… :)(Dick Morris can lick our toes).
One always fails if they bluster against competent people when all they have is their own hot air. That’s why good Democrats always win over bad Republicans.
Susan Rice is crispy around the edges. Republicans are refusing to endorse her… Why? When pressed by reporters the answer is… they don’t know.
They tried to pin the Benghazi hearings on her. That backfired. She was telling what was thought at the time. Republicans say… you should have said you didn’t know instead of saying what you thought was true…. Not many other then Breitbart readers are buying that one.
Her real sin, it appears, is that she is our UN ambassador. Republicans hate the UN.. Why? If the US wants to attack Canada for tar sands, the UN will object. If the US wants to attack Newfoundland to change its timezone by one half an hour…. the UN will object. If the US attacks Iraq to steal its oil, the UN will object……
That is why the Republicans don’t like the UN. They can’t attack random countries. The UN recently supported Palestine over their favorite child Israel, giving it another bad mark in Republicans eyes… For you see? Republicans have a basic flaw. If you hand them a giant bag of money, and tell them what to believe, THAT becomes what they believe… Forget facts.
Now, conservative pundits are becoming worried. It appears that all the noise they created, as of itself, pushed Susan Rice into the number one contender. Originally, no one outside of the beltway and New York, knew who she was. Now thanks to Republicans, we all know her name… And the more we see of her, the better she appears over other contenders to take over the Hillary Clinton legacy.
As anyone who has just come from seeing the movie “Lincoln” knows, the Secretary of State needs to be on a very personal relationship with the president. Obama and Clinton though once adversaries, did sit on quite a few stages together throughout the primary campaign. That relationship has worked well.
The president gets to chose who he wants. The Republicans have offered a list of those who they recommend. However, based upon the election, the direction the American people want to go, is directly opposite the way Republicans want to take us… In fact, it should be argued that the election proved concisely that Republicans are going in the wrong direction. Beaten back on every platitude they uttered, the American people said “no! We don’t like what you say, how you act, or what your policies are.”
So the Republican list, should read as…. these people are exactly the ones who should not be Secretary of State. In fact, based upon the election’s results, by sitting back and seeing whom the Republicans object to the most…. should point the finger at who will become our best Secretary of State…
That person appears to be Susan Rice.
She is reportedly blunt, or crisp around the edges, at times. Yet, her detractors are decrying that on the talk shows… she was not blunt enough.. She was diplomatic, obfuscating, pleasant, and believable. So, since they are using her bluntness against her, and her non-bluntness against her at the same time, it is obvious that as with everything else on Capitol Hill right now, Republicans are in disarray. Repbumblicans don’t know what they want… Which is why,… no news source should be noting their objections except to make fun of them.
If she has the president’s confidence, it sounds like the Benghazi episode in itself, PROVES she has all the qualifications she needs… If she made the world believe the incident was caused by a video, (without intention of course) thereby buying time for the US to rescue it’s informants, I would think she would have the perfect qualifications to be Secretary of State….
Some of us can remember a Chief Executive once saying: We do not have spy planes flying over Russia”, less than a week before one got shot down…. Sometimes, you have to lie to your enemies….
The fact that John McCain, Susan Rice’s biggest critic, thinks Sarah Palin is the smartest woman in the world (at least back in 2008) shows the world how good of a judge he is when it comes to women and that little matter of their intelligence.
So, if this Rice IS a little crispy wound the edges…. it is time to move forward and to serve the world a wondreful batch of: Rice Crispy Treats….. 🙂
Priceless. Republicans are imploding like exploding chickens on Skyrim.
Yes. It is true. John McCain missed a critical Senate Intelligence hearing behind closed doors, to hold a press conference referred below, to complain we needed a special committee to get the truth on Benghazi. Senator Collins, who was also on the committee, and who was also in the briefing, said it was funny that McCain would miss such an opportunity to get the full facts from all sources.
The AP is reporting that the story told publicly about the riots being over the movie, was to stall Al Qaeda and the terrorists from knowing what we knew. In essence, it was done to throw a smokescreen across our spy system, buying time to make adjustments in personal who had been compromised by the attack…
It is all McCain needed to know. It shuts down the entire Republican attack. It shows that Obama is truly the best president we have had in our lifetimes. It suggests that the entire Benghazi event was scripted by Republicans just to create drag on Obama before the election.
Why would McCain do something so silly? Well here is an idea. McCain will not be head of any committee next term. He could if he wanted, be head of the Committee on Indian Affairs, but that is a step down in prestige. Perhaps if he could create a new committee, one on which he was chairman, one that would be in the daily news feed, inviting himself on talk shows and newscasts,… he could keep some of his prestige?
In the press conference by those Republicans still trying to stir up Benghazi outrage, long after (1 week) after the election, a reporter questioned McCain as to why a hearing for Benghazi was being questioned, but we had unsecured Afghanistan documents in a unsecured socialite’s computer in Tampa.
John McCain said that was the dumbest question he’d ever answered… Four Americans died.
The follow up, was that what if more Americans were or did die from the breech of information? Wouldn’t that then be a graver threat than stirring up ashes from something that could be determined later and did not warrant such a grand scale such as a hearing, when an even greater episode was unfolding before our eyes?
Lindsey Graham stepped up to deflect the question…
But before I made up my mind, I went back and looked at the pictures of Kelley and Paula…. and said…” Damn, why are we even talking about Benghazi?” Can you even imagine the pics that went back and forth, leaking out and showing up on line, or some of the sexting, or maybe some soft porn?” I’m just beginning to…
Hell yeah!!!! Let’s instead hold hearing on the Petraeus breech of protocol… Yeah, Baby!!!
kavips 
