UPDATED:On these benghazi hearings and scandal

I know I have written about this subject before and now, I believe my opinion is changing.

For the record, I believe that the terrorist attack in Libya was a tragic event. But, these hearings make me want to vomit.

…and here is why:

Look who is representing these “Whistleblowers”, Via the BooMan Tribune: (H/T Little Green Footballs)

Joseph diGenova and Victoria Toensing run a law firm together. They are also married. They are also soldiers in the dirty wars we have between the two major parties. When Scooter Libby was indicted, diGenova and Toensing demanded a pardon. In fact, they had been brawling on Libby’s side for years. Toensing even authored an amici curiae brief with the US Court of Appeals in Washington, seeking to overturn the ruling that forced Matthew Cooper and Judy Miller to testify in the Libby case.

Back in 1998, Howard Kurtz reported that diGenova and Toensing had made 300 television appearances in the month after news of the l’affaire Lewinsky broke on Drudge Report. That’s an average of five appearances each, every day for a month. Who appointed them to head the lynch mob?

Strangely, Geraldo Rivera played a part.

“I love him and I love his wife,” the talk host and fellow lawyer says. “They’re the most honorable people inside the Beltway. . . . He’s a strong, principled guy who doesn’t back down. If I played any part in making him a media star, I gloat with pleasure.”

More from Howard Kurtz, circa 1998:

Name a high-profile investigation in this city and chances are the prosecutorial pair is involved.

Charges that Republican Rep. Dan Burton improperly demanded campaign contributions from a lobbyist for Pakistan? DiGenova and Toensing are the Indiana congressman’s personal attorneys.

Newt Gingrich’s ethics problems? Toensing represents the speaker’s wife, Marianne, to ensure her compliance with House ethics rules.

A House committee investigation of the Teamsters and the union’s links to improper Democratic fund-raising? DiGenova and Toensing are leading the probe as outside counsel.

They are nothing more than partisan brawlers. And now they are representing so-called Benghazi whistleblowers who claim they have faced intimidation from their employers in the State Department. Mr. diGenova is representing Mark I. Thompson, who is a deputy coordinator for operations in the State Department’s counterterrorism bureau. Ms. Toensing is representing Gregory N. Hicks, who was serving as the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Libya at the time of the Benghazi attacks. Both men will testify on Wednesday before Rep. Darrell Issa’s House Oversight & Government Reform Committee.

If they wanted to be taken seriously, they would have retained less notorious counsel.

Yeah, I know, I quoted the entire thing…sue me. 😛

Let me also be a fair person and point out that Charles Johnson over at Little Green Footballs has done one hell of a good job covering this whole partisan witch hunt since the beginning. I know, he most likely does not care for me at all; and most likely thinks I am in with the crazy right. But, I am not, at all. I do not agree entirely with his politics. But, I give him credit for being the guy to go after people who traffic in smearing those of whom they disagree with politically. While all the while, waving the flag of a protected minority and accusing those who dare to question as being Anti-Semitic. That, my friends, is the tragic state of the modern day Conservative movement. This is why I try to separate myself from the Neocon right.

Update: Some more thoughts that I wanted to add, but realized that this blog entry was getting long. Well, it is a long piece — deal with it. Here is my questions to the Neocon right about these whistle blowers:

  1. Where were these so-called “whistleblowers” when the United States of America was invading the Country of Iraq based upon blatantly false information about so-called “Weapons of Mass Destruction”? I mean, if there was any sort of false information being pimped to the media, and there was, trust me — these people would have known about it. 
  2. Where were these so-called  “Whistleblowers” when the United States of America was attacked on 9/11? I mean, if there was any sort of false information being pimped to the media, and there was, trust me — these people would have known about it. 

You want to know where these people where? I will tell you where they were; they were standing around with their noses straight up the goddamned ass of President George W. Bush and the neocon administration in the White House, that’s where!

This is why I have not been writing about this whole thing; because I knew the minute that the right began pimping this tragic event out for political purposes; that this political partisan witch hunt was starting. This is the same stuff that the Republican Party and it’s elected officials on the hill did in the 1990’s with the Clinton scandal and this is what they are doing now.  It is nothing more than that good ol’ partisan political theater — for the sole purpose of destroying their enemies.  It is sick, it is cynical, it is un-American and it should stop. What makes it much worse is that it is racist in nature — in more ways than one. The Nation’s first black President and you have old, White, Conservative, Christian Republicans going after him. But, yet, the Republicans are not the racists, the Democrats are — so they say. 🙄

It is, like all politics these days — nothing but a horrible joke. 😡

Update #2: Just as I suspected, this hearing is nothing more than a partisan witch hunt; this right here confirms it and yes, for once : I agree with Jay Carney.

Update #3: Seen this on facebook:

Under Bush:
Jan 22nd, 2002: US Consulate at Kolkata, 5 killed.
June 14, 2002: US Consulate at Karachi, 12 killed.
February 28, 2003 US Embassy at Islamabad: 2 killed.
June 30, 2004 US Embassy at Tashkent, 2 killed.
December 6, 2004 US Compound at Saudi Arabia, 9 killed.
March 2, 2006 US Consulate at Karachi (2nd time), 2 killed.
September 12, 2006: US Embassy at Syria, 4 killed.
March 18, 2008 US Embassy at Yemen, 2 Killed.
July 9, 2008 US Consulate at Istanbul, 6 killed.
September 17th, 2008 US Embassy at Yemen, 16 killed.
60 total
Outraged Republicans: Zero.

I can almost hear it now, “Yeah, but that was Bush and he actually loved this Country, unlike Obama.” 🙄

Update 4: Oh, By the way, Why am I saying all of this? Because like these two people in this video here; I happen to know there is really no difference between these two political parties anymore — That’s why!

Update 5: Cross-posted to My FiredogLake Update 6: Great, someone over at FDL marked my Diary as spam. Nice guys. I defend Obama and that’s the thanks I get? Nice. 🙄 Partisanship is such a drag. 🙁

Update 7: I think another point that people on the left are forgetting is this; the neoconservative hawks on the right were the ones that told Obama, “You have to something in Libya!” and you know what? He did. This idea was debated among the right, but the anti-hawks were overruled.  Boots were put on the ground to help the Libyan rebels. Then, we were actually foolish enough to open a United States embassy there.  All the while knowing that terrorists were operating in that Country. As a result, we lost an ambassador. So, as far as this writer is concerned,  the persons to blame for this horribly tragic event are the neoconservative hawks, like Bill Kristol, John Podhoretz and those whom agree with them.

 

About Adam Kokesh and his really stupid idea

I am a bit late to this one, and I really was not going to write anything about it. However, after seeing the following video, that I am going to share, I felt compelled to write a little something about it.

First of all, let me say that I am not anti-gun. I am not even really into Wilsonian foreign policy. Furthermore, I happen to know that the United States of America is not even a Democracy; but rather a constitutional Republic. (…and not a “Christian Republic”, as some on the so-called “Christian Right” like to claim that it is.) This video here, pretty much sums up my political stance. Which is pretty ironic, considering Bush wanted to export democracy over to Iraq; how can we export something that we’re not? But, I digress.

However, because I happen to believe in common sense, something that is in hideously short supply in America to today; I happen be a bit annoyed at the fact that a one Adam Kokesh has some moronic idea about organizing an armed march to Washington D.C. JazzShaw, who writes weekends over at HotAir.com has the story and I am not going to quote any of it here at all. I want you to go read about this moron’s idea of getting the United States Government’s attention on guns. I also will point you to a posting by Michelle Malkin from 2010 on her blog about this guy and his true stripes. I also point you to this blog posting from 2007 at “This ain’t hell” about this guy and his true stripes.

Okay now this is where I am going with this all. The following is why I do not have much use for people like Adam Kokesh and his libertarian friends or any use for people like Alex Jones.

Video: (WARNING: THIS VIDEO IS EXTREMELY GRAPHIC AND HARD TO WATCH. DO NOT WATCH THIS IN FRONT OF CHILDREN!)

Check out this gallery of books and other interesting stuff found in this guy’s car.

The story via the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

MIDDLEFIELD, Ohio — Police here said today they still do not know why James Gilkerson jumped out his car and began firing at Middlefield police officers who had pulled him over after Gilkerson had run a stop sign in the village.

They did say Gilkerson fired 37 rounds from an AK-47 rifle on March 10, and that the two officers fired back with 54 rounds of their own, killing the Mentor-on-the Lake man.

Police showed the dash cam video of the shootout during a news conference. They also distributed a statement from the Lake County prosecutor saying the shooting by police was justified and the matter would not be taken to a grand jury.

“He got of the vehicle, intending to kill my officers. We don’t know why he did it,” said Police Chief Arnold Stanko.

Stanko said police found eight, 40-round magazines for the AK-47 in Gilkerson’s car along with a number of books and magazines about militias and terrorism.

The names of some of the literature were “Backyard Rocketry: Converting Model Rockets Into Explosive Missiles,” “Advanced Close-range Gun Fighting,” “Homemade Detonators: How To Make Them.” Another described how to get rid of a dead body.

“He was a scumbag, and a terrorist, and he’s dead,” Stanko said.

Gilkerson fired on the officers on Ohio 608, near Pierce Street.

Stanko said one of his officers, Erin Thomas, got out of the patrol car after Gilkerson was pulled over, walked around the car, and got to about the driver’s side door of the cruiser when Gilkerson bolted from his car and began shooting.

Stanko said Thomas fired back, as did her partner Brandon Savage. Stanko said Savage returned fire through the windshield of the cruiser.

Stanko said Gilkerson was shot several times, but kept firing. During the gunfight, Gilkerson shouted, “Kill me.”

Thomas, a former Woodmere officer, still is not back to work. She lost a finger in the encounter. Savage had minor injuries to his left thigh. He is back at work, the chief said. 

The chief said police could find little in the way of ammunition and books in the home Gilkerson shared with his mother. He said he did not know if Gilkerson kept his weapon, ammunition and the books in his car all the time or if he had piled it all in side that day.

Okay folks, here is the truth and I know this is going to piss some people off. Well, you know what? TOUGH SHIT! The truth is my friends that this guy was most likely a follower of Alex Jones and his kooky conspiracy theories. He might have had some mental issues of some sort; but something triggered this guy to intentionally break the law, so that the cops would go after him and he could get out of his car, open up on the cops and go out in a blaze of glory.  I happen to believe that it is not a gun problem, but a far-right wing, Alex Jones kooky conspiracy theory problem.

I have one thing to say about this whole thing. If anyone is hurt or killed in this so-called March on DC with loaded guns —:

SEND THE BODIES TO MATT DRUDGE, ALEX JONES AND ADAM KOKESH! 

Matt Drudge is the one that teases the inflammatory headlines, Matt Drudge links to Alex Jones; Alex Jones pimps out the kooky conspiracy theories and Adam Kokesh laps it all up and goes out and does idiot things like this march. This my friends is what the right in this Country has become; a fucking absolutely idiot parody of its former self. This irrational fear that Obama is going to tear up the constitution and somehow or another transform America into some kind of Communist Country is stoked by these two people and someone needs to get to Drudge and tell him to cut the crap. Because the Conservative/Republican/Tea Party/Small Government/Liberty movement is being delegitimized more and more, every time someone does something like in the video above. This is called acting out over irrational fear.

Now, it is not just Drudge, Jones or even Kokesh — It is the entire right-wing blogosphere! I have blogged since 2006. I can tell you that the Bush-era blogosphere does not even remotely hold a candle to the way things are now in the Conservative Blogosphere. The sad truth is that the Conservative Blogosphere has gone off the rails; just like the liberal blogosphere did during the Bush-era — especially after the defeat of John Kerry in 2004. My God, they are doing the very same things.  It is that same irrational behaviour, the same vitriol, the same idiocy; and just like in the Bush era — they a beginning to sound like parody of themselves.  This is why, as much as I hate to be the one to say it — the Republican Party lost two elections. Not because who was running, because of what the right had become after the departure of George W. Bush from the White House.

It was bad enough to make some people leave the “right”, like this guy here. I cannot really blame him, some of the stuff that I see in the headlines, makes me wonder, who are the people running these blogs? Do they really believe some of the stuff that they write? Now, it is not lost on me at all, that I happen to be a part of that group. I am in a way; and in another way, I am not. I do not consider myself to be that much of a right-winger. I tend to cut it right down the middle. I love my Country and all; but I will the first to tell you that neither of these two political parties are perfect, nor are they political or moral absolutes. I believed this in 2006 and I still believe it now.

This is why I have not been writing on this blog much since Mitt Romney lost the election. Because I honestly fear that something I might write, just might trigger some dude, who is not quite with it; to go off and act out like in the way in the video above. This is also why I sometimes want to take my old blog down; because there were times in the past, when I wrote someone while, “Caught up in the moment.” and I fear that writing could trigger someone to do something crazy. This is also why I try to keep things in the “Common Sense” area, when it comes to running this blog. I just do not always jump on a headline, until it begins to pass the smell test. I tend to avoid Alex Jones style of headlines. Because I do not want to trigger something, like in the above video.

Hopefully, that all makes sense to someone…. it does to me.

The Bottom Line: I love my Country, I just do not trust my Government — BUT! I am not interested in trying to go out and kill a bunch of police officers, because of that — and neither should anyone else. Neither should anyone write anything anywhere that would trigger someone to want to do that. This is called irresponsibility and there is a good deal of that in the right wing media world right now.

Others: The Impolitic, This ain’t Hell …, Hot Air, americanthinker.com, No More Mister Nice Blog, Balloon Juice, The Huffington Post, The Raw Story and The Right Scoop

Why do liberal women do stupid stuff like this?

How stupid can you really get?

The Story:

The University of Wyoming Police Department issued a citation Monday afternoon in Albany County Circuit Court for Meg Lanker-Simons, a woman allegedly threatened last week in a social media post authorities now contend was a hoax.

The citation is for interference, a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment up to a year and a fine up to $1,000.

“Subject admitted to making a controversial post on UW Crushes webpage and then lied about not doing it,” according to the citation.

She is scheduled to appear at 9 a.m. May 13 in Circuit Court.

The post was made to the UW Crushes page April 24 on Facebook and described Lanker-Simons as “that chick that runs her liberal mouth all the time and doesn’t care who knows it.”

The post also referenced a graphic, sexual act against Lanker-Simons.

“One night with me and shes gonna be a good Republican (expletive),” the post read.

The post created a stir on social media and at the university, with school officials issuing statements denouncing the post against Lanker-Simons and campus police opening an investigation.

Lanker-Simons could not be reached for comment.

UW released a statement Tuesday afternoon regarding the citation.

“This episode has sparked an important discussion reaffirming that the UW community has no tolerance for sexual violence or violence of any type,” UW spokesman Chad Baldwin said. “The fact that the Facebook post apparently was a fabrication does not change the necessity for continued vigilance in reassuring that we have a campus where everyone feels safe.

via UW Police: Facebook post was a hoax — UPDATED – Laramie Boomerang Online.

I will not make snide remarks about her weight, like I have seen on twitter about her. As I am quite the hefty man myself. Those of you who have, will rot in the devil’s hell, I assure you of that. 😡   I just do not understand what this stupid woman was trying to accomplish. I mean, did she not know that the police would have the ability to see who posted that? Has this brain-dead feminist-Nazi ever heard of IP addresses before? I mean, to call this dumb broad anything remotely related to Nazism is an insult to Adolf Hitler himself! 😯 I mean, Adolf might have been evil, but at least he was not this stupid! 😛

You know, I have always believed that this new generation of kids coming up today, lack a good deal of common sense. This here, proves that well beyond reasonable doubt. 🙄 I am 40 years old by the way, going on 41 in June; I can say stuff like that — you’re welcome.

Related:

Others: Althouse,  The Jawa Report, This ain’t Hell …, The Daily Caller, Rush Limbaugh, Riehl World News, The Right Scoop, The Gateway Pundit,Wake up America and Lawyers, Guns & Money

 

When a blogger dies

A voice is silenced, a keyboard and voice goes black.

We bloggers; left and right, are the 6’th estate, which rail against the corporate media and against tyrannical Governments  —- no matter which side politically that they happen to be on and where those Governments happen to be in the World of ours. Our battle is not with guns, or knives; or even fists. We battle with the very thing that can change the course of human history —- words.

We have lost another voice, another fighter in the battle for the soul of America. Another voice in the argument of ideas. Another voice of independent media.

Amusing Bunni has died

For the record: I did not even know her personally; nor did I have any personal interaction with her. However, I happen to be  co-enlisted with her, in this battle for the soul of this great Country of ours. We both were were writers and yes, bloggers. Those of us, who still believed in the founding principles of this great Country of ours. One of which is a timeless principle —- Freedom.

Godspeed to her, may she rest in peace.

Update: Camp of the Saints has a excellent posting up remembering this blogger as well.

Yeah, that’s all we need! A Cuban Joseph McCarthy!

Boy, the GOP sure is hell-bent on losing and I mean, badly in 2016 aren’t they?

Go read.

Freakin’ idiots deluxe. 🙄

Others: david-frum, Facebook, No More Mister Nice Blog, A plain blog about politics, Post Politics, The Week, First Read, Politico, Power Line, Daily Kos, Outside the Beltway, Weasel Zippers, Business Insider, The Moderate Voice, Mediaite, The Daily Caller, Hot Air and The Hinterland Gazette

Senator Claire McCaskill said What?!?!?

This also comes via HotAir.com and yes, via Ed Morrissey: (I only link to this one, because like Ed, My jaw went “CLANK!” when I saw this…)

Transcript:

BOB SCHIEFFER, “FACE THE NATION”: Do either of you at this point think there’s a chance that we would have to put U.S. troops in there or that we would want to?

SEN. CLAIRE MCCASKILL (D-MISSOURI): I don’t think you want to ever rule it out because I think this is, kind of, as — as Saxby said, this thing has really deteriorated, and it’s not really at a tipping point. So I don’t think you ever want to say absolutely not. Obviously, we don’t want to do that unless it’s absolutely necessary.

Do either of these two ding-a-lings have any idea what kind of troop commitment that would take? I mean, Syria is a huge Country and we would be fighting all sorts of people. (You know, kind of like….um, Iraq?)

Ed Morrissey sums it up:

We might be able to prevent that with a large-scale invasion and an equally large-scale occupation that lasts a decade or more, if we can get enough NATO members to come along with us and sell it to a Congress that has been acting as though Iraq was a huge mistake. That would include having to quell any insurgencies from Jabhat al-Nusra or related groups, along with fighting Hezbollah again. Anyone up for that kind of commitment? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

Funny how the same Democrats who were all like, “The War lost and we need to come home!” during Presidency of George W. Bush are the same ones who are now all, “A yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!” when it comes to Syria and Obama.  I think that some voices of sanity on the left really need to speak up right about now and tell these people, “Um, Folks? We tried that in Iraq and our butts are still sore and we lost like a bunch of people. Lets not do that, okay?”

This also proves a few things that I always did suspect; that the Anti-War movement, among the beltway Democrats; unlike the real grassroots Progressive anti-war movement —- was nothing more than an Anti-Bush partisan pet cause. Which quickly dried up once Obama was in office.  I am thinking that Bush knew this and this is why he would not cave to their demands, despite the fact that there was no WMD’s.

To be fair, I have always suspected that Libya was a partisan pet cause among the Republicans; which explains why it never gained in traction in Congress at all.  I mean, there were obviously some mistakes made; but the way the Republicans have drummed that story up, and yes, I do mean via Fox News —- makes me think it falls among partisan lines.  True, many Military people and grassroots Conservatives are concerned about it and rightly so. The Republicans simply made it their pet cause and will in 2014 and 2016; you watch. This is until it starts to generate backlash and they quickly drop it; like when they are elected. Again, watch what happens. I know the game, I have been around it long enough.

 

“Stay the hell out of Syria!” Says, HotAir.com?!?!?!??!

I happen to be checking out one of my many blogs that I read on a daily basis here,  and I happen to see the following:

From a strictly strategic point of view, why not let Hezbollah fight al-Qaeda affiliates and let them drain each other of strength?  That has to be a better outcome than victory for Assad or for the Nusrah Front and its AQ allies.  An American intervention that tips the scales towards AQ would be absurd, and yet that seems to be exactly what Republicans and Democrats in Washington want from the Obama administration.

If we are going to intervene, it should be with a heavy footprint that ends the Nusrah Front’s control of wide swaths of Syria.  That will take years, hundreds of thousands of troops, and probably trillions of dollars — but it’s the only way to intervene and keep Islamist terrorists from taking over large parts of Syria like they did in Libya, after a 30,000-foot intervention by Obama and NATO.  If we don’t want to pay that kind of price for intervention, then let’s stay the hell out of Syria in the first place.

Now, who would make such a statement? Lew Rockwell? Ron Paul? Rand Paul? The Editors at The American Conservative? Patrick J. Buchanan?

Why, No.

It was none other than Ed Morrissey at HotAir.com.

For what it is truly worth, Ed has a good point. This whole neocon idea of controlling the entire arab world is absurd and would come back to bite us anyhow. We lost a good deal of American treasure in Iraq and for what? Some bad intelligence that no one could be bothered to verify? As Ed basically said here; lets not make that same mistake twice. We cannot afford it anyhow, and I just happen to believe that America is war-weary anyhow, any sort of military action would a disaster for the Democrats and for America in general.

So, hats off to Ed Morrissey for speaking a truth, that might not be that popular in his own circles. Being a truth-teller in politics, especially in Conservative circles is a really hard thing at times. I am sure that he took it on the chin to speak that truth on that blog. My thoughts are with him, because, as I well know; speaking from the heart and shooting from the hip is not easy sometimes.

Man stabs 4 choir members at Albuquerque Catholic church

Crazy times we live in…:

Police say a knife-wielding lunatic ran into an Albuquerque, N.M. Catholic church Sunday, jumping pews before stabbing four choir members.

He yelled “fake preacher!” as he started his stabbing spree, witnesses told KOAT.

RELATED: QUEENS MAN STABBED TO DEATH

Several parishioners jumped on and held down the suspect, identified as 24-year-old Lawrence Capener, an Albuquerque police spokeswoman tells the Daily News.

via Man stabs 4 choir members during Sunday mass at Albuquerque Catholic church  – NY Daily News.

LA Times reports:

Another parishioner, Vanessa Lucero, 14, told The Times she was sitting right behind the man, who “was kind of twitchy, sketchy looking. He had a tattoo of an upside-down star on his wrist.”

Lucero said the man climbed over the pews, punched and then repeatedly stabbed the choir’s lead singer.

“He said, like, ‘False preacher!’ ” Lucero said. “I don’t know why.”

The congregation subdued the attacker, at which point more parishioners could have been stabbed, Stinson said.

After the suspect was in handcuffs, Lucero said, “Old ladies were telling him, ‘God bless you, forgive yourself,’ and he was saying, ‘You don’t know about the Masons.’ ” 

Neither witness had seen the man before. After the attack, Stinson said that the choir’s lead singer had stab wounds on his left arm and that his jacket was “torn to pieces.”

“At this point, we’re just trying to deal with it,” Father John C. Daniel said in a brief phone interview with The Times. “It sounds like everybody is going to be OK.”

In a statement, Albuquerque police confirmed that the suspect was in custody but did not release his identity.

[Update, 4:15 p.m. April 28: On Sunday afternoon, police identified the suspect as Lawrence Capener, 24. “He is currently being interviewed and will be facing numerous felony charges,” Albuquerque Police Department spokeswoman Tasia Martinez said in a statement.]

“It has been determined that he is not a parishioner,” police said. “As to the motive regarding the multiple stabbing, this has not yet been determined.”

Crazy days, Crazy people. Unreal. Oh, and I happen to know quite a bit about the Masons.  (another good resource here too.)

Others: Los Angeles Times, Scared Monkeys, Wake up America, The Hinterland Gazette and Riehl World News (Memeorandum)