Tuesday, October 16, 2012



POLITICIZED BENGHAZI DISTRACTS FROM BIG BIRD



Obama spokesperson Jen Psaki, speaking on board Air Force One on Thursday: “There’s only one candidate in this race who is going to continue to fight for Big Bird and Elmo, and he is riding on this plane.”

by Mark Steyn

Oct 13, 2012  - NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE

‘The entire reason that this has become the political topic it is is because of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan.”
Thus, Stephanie Cutter, President Obama’s deputy campaign manager, speaking on CNN about an armed attack on the 9/11 anniversary that left a U.S. consulate a smoking ruin and killed four diplomatic staff, including the first American ambassador to be murdered in a third of a century. To discuss this event is apparently to “politicize” it and to distract from the real issues the American people are concerned about. For example, Obama spokesperson Jen Psaki, speaking on board Air Force One on Thursday: “There’s only one candidate in this race who is going to continue to fight for Big Bird and Elmo, and he is riding on this plane.”

She’s right! The United States is the first nation in history whose democracy has evolved to the point where its leader is provided with a wide-body transatlantic jet in order to campaign on the vital issue of public funding for sock puppets. Sure, Caligula put his horse in the senate, but it was a real horse. At Ohio State University, the rapper will.i.am introduced the president by playing the Sesame Street theme tune, which oddly enough seems more apt presidential-walk-on music for the Obama era than “Hail to the Chief.”

Obviously, Miss Cutter is right: A healthy mature democracy should spend its quadrennial election on critical issues like the Republican party’s war on puppets rather than attempting to “politicize” the debate by dragging in stuff like foreign policy, national security, the economy, and other obscure peripheral subjects. But, alas, it was her boss who chose to “politicize” a security fiasco and national humiliation in Benghazi. At 8:30 p.m., when Ambassador Stevens strolled outside the gate and bid his Turkish guest good night, the streets were calm and quiet. At 9:40 p.m., an armed assault on the compound began, well planned and executed by men not only armed with mortars but capable of firing them to lethal purpose — a rare combination among the excitable mobs of the Middle East.

There was no demonstration against an Islamophobic movie that just got a little out of hand. Indeed, there was no movie protest at all. Instead, a U.S. consulate was destroyed and four of its personnel were murdered in one of the most sophisticated military attacks ever launched at a diplomatic facility.

This was confirmed by testimony to Congress a few days ago, although you could have read as much in my column of four weeks ago. Nevertheless, for most of those four weeks, the president of the United States, the secretary of state, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and others have persistently attributed the Benghazi debacle to an obscure YouTube video — even though they knew that the two events had nothing to do with each other by no later than the crack of dawn Eastern time on September 12, by which point the consulate’s survivors had landed safely in Tripoli.

To “politicize” means “to give a political character to.” It is a reductive term, capturing the peculiarly shrunken horizons of politics: “Gee, they nuked Israel. D’you think that will hurt us in Florida?” So media outlets fret that Benghazi could be “bad” for Obama — by which they mean he might be hitting the six-figure lecture circuit four years ahead of schedule. But for Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty, and Tyrone Woods, it’s real bad. They’re dead, over, gonesville. Given that Obama and Secretary Clinton refer to Stevens pneumatically as “Chris,” as if they’ve known him since third grade, why would they dishonor the sacrifice of their close personal friend by peddling an utterly false narrative as to why he died? You want “politicization”? Secretary Clinton linked the YouTube video to the murder of her colleagues even as the four caskets lay alongside her at Andrews Air Force Base — even though she had known for days that it had nothing to do with it. It’s weird enough that politicians now give campaign speeches to returning coffins. But to conscript your “friend”’s corpse as a straight man for some third-rate electoral opportunism is surely as shriveled and worthless as “politicization” gets.

In the vice-presidential debate, asked why the White House spent weeks falsely blaming it on the video, Joe Biden took time off between big toothy smirks to reply: “Because that was exactly what we were told by the intelligence community.” That too is false. He also denied that the government of which he is nominally second-in-command had ever received a request for additional security. At the risk of “politicizing” things, this statement would appear also to be untrue.

Instead, the State Department outsourced security for the Benghazi consulate to Blue Mountain, a Welsh firm that hires ex-British and -Commonwealth special forces, among the toughest hombres on the planet. The company’s very name comes from the poem “The Golden Journey to Samarkand,” whose words famously adorn the regimental headquarters of Britain’s Special Air Service in Hereford.  Unfortunately, the one-year contract for consulate security was only $387,413 — or less than the cost of deploying a single U.S. soldier overseas. On that budget, you can’t really afford to fly in a lot of crack SAS killing machines, and have to make do with the neighborhood talent pool. So who’s available? Blue Mountain hired five members of the Benghazi branch of the February 17 Martyrs’ Brigade and equipped them with handcuffs and batons. A baton is very useful when someone is firing an RPG at you, at least if you play a little baseball. There were supposed to be four men heavily armed with handcuffs on duty that night, but, the date of September 11 having no particular significance in the Muslim world, only two guards were actually on shift.

Let’s pause right there, and “politicize” a little more. Liberals are always going on about the evils of “outsourcing” and “offshoring” — selfish vulture capitalists like Mitt shipping jobs to cheap labor overseas just to save a few bucks. How unpatriotic can you get! So now the United States government is outsourcing embassy security to cheap Welshmen who in turn outsource it to cheaper Libyans. Diplomatic facilities are U.S. sovereign territory — no different de jure from Fifth Avenue or Mount Rushmore. So defending them is one of the core responsibilities of the state. But that’s the funny thing about Big Government: The bigger it gets, the more of life it swallows up, the worse it gets at those very few things it’s supposed to be doing. So, on the first anniversary of 9/11 in a post-revolutionary city in which Western diplomats had been steadily targeted over the previous six months, the government of the supposedly most powerful nation on earth entrusted its security to Abdulaziz Majbari, 29, and his pal, who report to some bloke back in Carmarthen, Wales. 

In the days before the attack Joe Biden had been peddling his Obama campaign slogan that “bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive.” The first successful terrorist attack on U.S. sovereign territory since 9/11, and on the very anniversary and by al-Qaeda-linked killers, was not helpful to the Obama team. And so the nature of the event had to be “politicized”: Look, over there — an Islamophobic movie! “Greater love hath no man than this,” quoth the president at Chris Stevens’ coffin, “that a man lay down his life for his friends.” Smaller love hath no man than Obama’s, than to lay down his “friend” for a couple of points in Ohio.




26 comments:

  1. Interesting that Steyn is incensed at the use of mercenaries and writes as if it started with Obama.

    Of course Mark ignores Chucklenuts' privatization of much of the Iraqi occupation.

    I also enjoy the "Big Bird" meme. Mittens uses the phrase ad suddenly it belongs to Obama. Bit dishonest, even for a fringe right idiot like Steyn.
    But back to the main point. The mercenaries will always disappoint. So enjoy your privatization. I love it when a fringe right plan fails and they start whining.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete
  3. “bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive.”

    "bin Laden is dead but so are Ambassadore Chris Stevens and 3 other Americans."

    THAT should be the quote that Romney uses in tonight's debate!

    ReplyDelete
  4. That an Obama spokesperson said those words is mind boggling!

    Ludicrous!

    Deserving of ridicule!

    The Obama administration and his minions are so disconnected and so caught up in trivia.

    **snorts with disgust**

    ReplyDelete
  5. the United States government is outsourcing embassy security to cheap Welshmen who in turn outsource it to cheaper Libyans

    Surreal, isn't it?

    Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anyone who would categorize Mark Steyn as an "idiot" is, himself, either mentally deficient or simply perverse -- take your pick.

    I'm betting on the latter.

    Stupidity is pitiable. Perversity should be punishable.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Ducky Wucky is especially stung lately, his hero Obama is becoming indefensible, so in good democrat fashion he lashes out at the messengers.

    Nobody mixes hard facts and humorous sarcasm like Mark Steyn. He's the most brilliant and entertaining writer out there today.

    Nobody can scathe like Steyn!

    ReplyDelete
  8. My hero Obama?
    Silverfiddle, I kinda like you but I find it reprehensible that you would call me a supporter of the right of center corporate stooge.

    The gauntlet s down sir. I demand satisfaction.

    Now, did Chucklenuts oversee extensive privatization of the military of didn't he. This is all part of the same neocon stream. One in which Mittens swims, I might add.

    ReplyDelete
  9. DELECTABLE QUOTE UMBER ONE:


    "The United States is the first nation in history whose democracy has evolved to the point where its leader is provided with a wide-body transatlantic jet in order to campaign on the vital issue of public funding for sock puppets. Sure, Caligula put his horse in the senate, but it was a real horse."

    ReplyDelete
  10. DELECTABLE QUOTE NUMBER TWO:

    "A healthy mature democracy should spend its quadrennial election on critical issues like the Republican party’s war on puppets rather than attempting to “politicize” the debate by dragging in stuff like foreign policy, national security, the economy, and other obscure peripheral subjects. But, alas, it was her boss who chose to “politicize” a security fiasco and national humiliation in Benghazi."

    ReplyDelete
  11. DELECTABLE QUOTE NUMBER THREE:

    "[M]edia outlets fret that Benghazi could be “bad” for Obama — by which they mean he might be hitting the six-figure lecture circuit four years ahead of schedule. But for Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty, and Tyrone Woods, it’s real bad. They’re dead, over, gonesville.

    "Given that Obama and Secretary Clinton refer to Stevens pneumatically as “Chris,” as if they’ve known him since third grade, why would they dishonor the sacrifice of their close personal friend by peddling an utterly false narrative as to why he died?"

    ReplyDelete
  12. DELECTABLE QUOTE UMBER FOUR:

    "You want “politicization”? Secretary Clinton linked the YouTube video to the murder of her colleagues even as the four caskets lay alongside her at Andrews Air Force Base — even though she had known for days that it had nothing to do with it. "

    ReplyDelete
  13. DELECTABLE QUOTE NUMBER FIVE:

    [T]he State Department outsourced security for the Benghazi consulate to Blue Mountain, a Welsh firm that hires ex-British and Commonwealth special forces, among the toughest hombres on the planet.

    "The company’s very name comes from the poem “The Golden Journey to Samarkand,” whose words famously adorn the regimental headquarters of Britain’s Special Air Service in Hereford.

    "Unfortunately, the one-year contract for consulate security was only $387,413 — or less than the cost of deploying a single U.S. soldier overseas.

    "On that budget, you can’t really afford to fly in a lot of crack SAS killing machines, and have to make do with the neighborhood talent pool. So who’s available?

    "Blue Mountain hired five members of the Benghazi branch of the February 17 Martyrs’ Brigade and equipped them with handcuffs and batons."

    ReplyDelete
  14. DELECTABLE QUOTE NUMBER SIX:

    {"A] funny thing about Big Government: The bigger it gets, the more of life it swallows up, the worse it gets at those very few things it’s supposed to be doing.

    "So, on the first anniversary of 9/11 in a post-revolutionary city in which Western diplomats had been steadily targeted over the previous six months, the government of the supposedly most powerful nation on earth entrusted its security to Abdulaziz Majbari, 29, and his pal, who report to some bloke back in Carmarthen, Wales."

    ReplyDelete
  15. Delectable Quote No. Seven:

    She has also been praised by Mother Nature Network for the "keen business sense" with which she feeds her family on $80 a week by clipping copious coupons, playing Bingo, exploiting roadkill and acquiring child support checks from each of her four children’s fathers.

    Ooops, my bad, that's from the Wiki entry on Honey Boo Boo's family.
    I got curious since it's going around that Honey Boo Boo endorsed Obama on Jimmy Kimmel.

    But don't get all wound up, Snooki endorsed Mittens.

    I love American politics.

    ReplyDelete
  16. And Honey Boo Boo endorsed Obama.

    You can't make up this nonsense.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Delectable Quote Number 4 doesn't bode well for Hillary.

    Well, unless she can prove that Obama forced her to do so. If there's a paper trail....

    ReplyDelete
  18. It's too bad you were never acquainted with The Tightwad Gazette, Ducks.

    I think back issues may still be read online.

    It originated with a woman in Maine who raised something like 28 children on fifty bucks a week and made a success of it.

    As a people our priorities and sense of values have become so demented and perverted we have completely lost touch with what is and is not important.

    My maternal grandmother might well have authored such a journal, herself.

    And I was "statistically poor" much of my life, and always managed to live very well in site of it.

    Instead of pitying yourself, you treat life like a GAME, and you play to WIN.

    OUTWIT the DIRTY BASTARDS! was -- and remains my motto.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Yeah, Ducky likes American politics, but not as much as he likes politburo politics.

    Biden has incorporated a strange campaign slogan: “bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive.” GM may still be sucking air but the stock ain't what it used to be when the dead breath of the state gave it the Heimlich Maneuver and it puked up all its old debt at the expense of those who invested in it earlier.

    Bin Laden could possibly be dead. Who has seen the body and why would anybody believe those who said he was killed in that raid. Even Seal Team Six is dead, so dead men can't tell any tales.

    Mark Steyn has a knack of excoriating the loony left with a sharp wit that is sadly lacking in most leftists. And Steyn resides in the "Live Free or Die" state which says a lot positive about the man.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Mark Steyn is my FAVORITE political columnist by far, Waylon. Such a cheery, good-natured guy, even when he's pinning morons to the mat with irrefutabe logic and a rapier wit. ;-)

    He claims to be a Canadian who was educated in Britain, but now lives in New Hampshire by choice.

    Has the strangest accent -- sounds more British than anything else, but there seems to be a trace of Australian in there someplace. I can't quite place it, but I love him anyway.

    There are so few MEN left in the West it's pitiful.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Steyn at one time a few years ago wrote in The National Post when it was started by Conrad Black. I began subscribing to it because I liked Mark Steyn's columns. He also wrote for MacLean's magazine and then got into problems with the politically correct sect and they went after the magazine and Steyn himself.

    Anyway a lot of water has passed under the bridge since then. Conrad Black sold his media emporium and did some hard time in the big house in Florida. He's been released and is back in Canada and writes a weekly column for the National Post. But he gave up his Canadian citizenship years ago to be able to accept a royal title in England so he still has to settle some small problems.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Mark Steyn did live in Canada but I always thought he was born in South Africa. I think he was living in Montreal before he moved to New Hampshire. He does have a unique accent.

    I had a bit of a run in with his designated mouth piece on a blog at FPM where the bitch was a contributor to the blog and I was happy enough to leave the place after that. Sort of showed the true colours of the real FPM, I guess. Even the moderator of the blog disappeared and I believe the blog even bowed out, since I could find no trace of it ... good riddance, IMO.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Waylon,

    Here's what Wiki says about Steyn's background:

    "Steyn was born in Toronto. He was baptized a Catholic and later confirmed in the Anglican Church;[3] he has stated that "the last Jewish female in my line was one of my paternal great-grandmothers" and that "both my grandmothers were Catholic".[4] Steyn's great-aunt was artist Stella Steyn.[5] Steyn was educated at the King Edward's School, Birmingham, in the United Kingdom."

    The confirmed he was still a canadian citizen who lives in New Hampshire, USA

    ~ FreeThinke

    ReplyDelete
  24. New Hampshire is quite a place, home to many spectacular people. Mark Steyn is one. Others include Benjamin Franklyn, President Pierce, and The Average American! Sorry, couldn't help myself! heh heh heh

    ReplyDelete
  25. Jeez, I just googled 'Mark Steyn born in South Africa' and found my own comment on your blog yesterday. The world is getting smaller I guess.

    For years I have thought he was born in South Africa. I believe I read it somewhere sometime in the past. He does have an accent that sound like it is from some different place.

    ReplyDelete

IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THE FOLLOWING, YOU DON'T BELONG HERE, SO KINDLY GET OUT AND STAY OUT.

We welcome Conversation
But without Vituperation.
If your aim is Vilification ––
Other forms of Denigration ––
Unfounded Accusation --
Determined Obfuscation ––
Alienation with Self-Justification ––
We WILL use COMMENT ERADICATION.


IN ADDITION

Gratuitous Displays of Extraneous Knowledge Offered Not To Shed Light Or Enhance the Discussion, But For The Primary Purpose Of Giving An Impression Of Superiority are obnoxiously SELF-AGGRANDIZING, and therefore, Subject to Removal at the Discretion of the Censor-in-Residence.

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.