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CiC Failed To Protect American Lives

Benghazi: Help America Find the Truth BEFORE the Election
By Roger L. Simon

Email us at Benghazi@pjmedia.com if you have unpublished and verifiable information about the 9/11 events in Libya. Read the post for details.

6 Green Lies Threatening to Starve You
By Walter Hudson

It started with the gas in your car. Now the green police are coming after the food in your fridge.


We have got to stop burning our food supply in the name of a flase premise.The only combustable liquid we should make from corn is 198 proof sour mash.

I Lost A Friend This Week

I lost a friend this week. A good friend. The kind of friend the song “You Find Out Who Your Friends Are” was written for. There was never a time when I asked for his help and he wouldn’t be there. We were friends for over 35 years. We did some monumentally stupid stuff in our youth. We were reckless, irresponsible and we took chances, but we had our version of fun when we were together, and while we may have been reckless and irresponsible in our own lives, we were never bad people.

In spite of all the stupid stuff, Billy was a good person. He was a good and decent man. He was content with his station in life and I never heard him blame anyone for it. He was deeply spiritual without being religious and his understanding of Biblical history and End Times prophesy was encyclopedic.

He was born 100 years too late. He lived simply. He gardened. He worked. He fished. He played. He read a lot. In the last 10 years, he expanded his knowledge and worked overseas installing power generating devices at US Embassies. He spent Independence Day 2003 in Yemen with the Marine detachment, something that made me very envious. He called me from The Gambia and described the western Atlantic coastline of Africa a year later. I have the African carving he brought me hanging on my wall.

It had been awhile since I saw him last. I stopped by one day a few weeks back, but he wasn’t home. The one thing about being friends with Billy was, no matter how long it had been since the last time you saw each other, the next time you saw each other was just a continuation of the last time. Chances are you’d just take up the conversation right where you left off, like one of you had just stepped out for a head call. I’m going to miss that.

I used to drive a moving van back in my youth. Billy had never been north of the Rappahannock River. He used to say he’d get the shakes the further North he went, and he was convinced if he crossed the Potomac River chaos would ensue. I needed a hand with a load of furniture, and Billy was willing. I took him to Pennsylvania where I proceeded to get a lung infection. Billy literally carried me into the hospital emergency room that morning. After that, he was only willing to go south on the truck with me. So I took him to Florida the next time. We had a blast.

We worked together off and on for the next 30 years. He was the best help I ever had, without exception. He was a good friend all the time. He was with me the day I caught the biggest largemouth I’ve ever seen outside of a Bill Dance commercial. Billy said it was the biggest he’d ever seen come out of the little pond we were on, and he had been fishing that pond since he was 10.

We were together on 9.11.2001.

I’m going to miss not being able to talk to him.
Thank you for your friendship over the past three and a half decades.

Sarkozy Knows Israel

Iranian militia attacks French, Italian, possibly Dutch embassies
DEBKAfile - Feb 09, 2010
DEBKA.com DEBKAfile
Special Report
February 9, 2010, 6:17 PM (GMT+02:00)

In a well-coordinated offensive, pro-government Basijj militiamen in civilian dress hurled rocks and eggs at the Italian and French embassies in Tehran Tuesday, Feb. 9, shouting death to their respective leaders. Some reports say the Dutch embassy was also targeted. debkafile's Iranian sources report the attacks appear to have kicked off the campaign for "stunning" the West - as threatened by spiritual ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, or "crushing" the West - in president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's words this week.

Our sources expect the government-instigated violence to escalate up to and including Thursday, Feb. 1, the start of anniversary events marking Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution. They are designed to raise international tensions around Iran to fever pitch to deter opposition leaders from staging their planned mass protest demonstrations lest they be accused of treason and collaborating with the Islamic republic's foreign foes.

The Iranian regime has a long score to settle with French president Nicolas Sarkozy and his ministers. They are the most outspoken of any Western critics of Iran, often citing intelligence input to prove Iran is running a military nuclear program and building a nuclear bomb. Sarkozy also warns that Israel will not stand by and let this happen without resorting to a military offensive that will generate a major war drawing Middle Eastern and other nations into the conflict.

Tehran's grievance against The Hague stems from the suspicion that the Dutch BVD national security service maintains the farthest-flung network of agents inside Iran of any other agency and the high quality of its intelligence on happenings inside the Islamic republic.

The One Is Gonna Have To Give The Prize Back

If he can't actually bring peace to a region.

Politicians can't win wars. Only generals can win wars.

General's D.C. Trip Put Off as Strategy Talks Drag On

Writers Karen DeYoung and Greg Jaffe report on what Peggy Noonan calls “the missing debate on Afghanistan” as the White House delays the return of Gen. Stanley McChrystal for a final meeting with President Obama – scheduled for this week – before the White House announces its new strategy for Afghanistan.

Much of the story is given over to praise from top Obama advisors for the president’s respect for the military chain of command. But however respectful, the president also seems keen to keep McChrystal off the Hill and out of the public dialogue.

This adds to the sense that the lengthy, private deliberations of the administration are part of an effort to look busy and buy time before Washington erupts over whatever has been decided.

“The State Department, the intelligence community and other major actors have presented their views during the ongoing White House meetings, and the appearance of Karl W. Eikenberry, the ambassador to Afghanistan, and Anne Patterson, his counterpart in Pakistan, are to be given significant weight. Some at the table have suggested a status quo strategy in which the current troop level of 68,000 would be maintained and more attention would be given to building the Afghan military, seeking reconciliation with some insurgent elements and solidifying ties with Pakistan.”

As Long As They Keep Doing This....

Taliban claim Afghan bomb, say embassy was target

KABUL- The Taliban have claimed responsibility for Thursday's suicide car bomb in the Afghan capital, saying their target was the Indian Embassy.

Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said in a statement posted on the group's Web site that the attacker was an Afghan man who blew up his sport utility vehicle laden with explosives just outside the embassy.

Afghan officials have said at least 12 people were killed and more than 80 wounded in the morning blast. The explosion occurred in an area that is also full of shops and near the Interior Ministry.

The Ambassador on the Front Lines

H/T Blackfive

We often, and justly, celebrate the US military and its members. We occasionally (and justly) express astonishment at the US State Department. Yet it is very much worth remembering that some of their members have led remarkable careers of service and contributed much to the American nation.
Among the greatest of these is Ambassador Ryan Crocker, who was General Petraeus' comerade in leading the strategy that saved Iraq from the fire. That was not the only thing of interest he has done, though, from hitch-hiking across Afghanistan, to being present at the Beruit bombing, to being our man in Kabul following the invasion and re-opening the US Embassy. His wife sets a standard for State Department wives as proud as that of a military wife, having remained by his side in theater even after their home was rocketed.
All of this, and more, is recounted in his retrospective on the years since 9/11. It's worth reading through. Some of it you may agree with, some not, but he has more than earned the right to be heard.

The Ambassador on the Front Lines

The 8 a.m. US Airways shuttle from Washington to New York City took off pretty much on time. The mid-September sky was clear, the air still, and most of the flight was perfectly uneventful. My State Department colleague David Pearce and I read the papers and looked over our notes as the plane began its descent toward LaGuardia.
"Look!" somebody said, and a rumble of alarmed voices spread through the cabin. One of the towers of the World Trade Center was on fire, and smoke churned over the upper stories like a thunderhead over lower Manhattan. We craned our necks to see through one window, then another as our plane banked and made its approach to the runway. Then, just as we landed, we saw in the distant skyline the second tower erupt in flames. Cell phones rang out, and random, frightened voices tried to make sense of what was happening.
For a diplomat, I have seen a lot of violence in my career. I survived the 1983 U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut that was, until that day in September 2001, among the most infamous attacks on Americans in the history of terrorism. David is as experienced in the Middle East as anyone we have at State. But you didn't need our expertise to know, when that plane hit the second tower, that this was the work of terrorists.