In 1858, the Seven Lincoln Douglas Debates was not only popular in Illinois, but the stenographers that transcribed the events for major newspapers were then covered in all the major papers in the Union. The Partisan newspapers, mostly Democrats, would edit out gaffes by Douglas or key debate points that they considered weak.
Now it appears in desperation, the media, motivated by meltdowns of their peers have decided to jump up on the stage and not just make their own arguments, but prop up the lies of their candidate with lies of their own and encourage the mob to hoot and applaud. Even the First Lady was clapping and cheering.
I remember in the Watergate era, we watched these same journalists pat themselves on the back as if they were saintly civil rights crusaders, because they had "saved the Republic" and one part of the narrative I fell for was the notion they peddled that with the new Television age, it would be more difficult, if not impossible for future Presidents to hide scandals or outright lie to coverup major policy failures and corruption that might hurt their chances of holding on to power.
Wow, was I wrong.
How could I have been so wrong to imagine Television would be used for truth and justice or that the power of government would be held in check by the priesthood of the box, which is the talking heads of the mainstream media.
It is clear Obama has made a decision to play semantical games from the school of the meaning of the word "Is".
The reason the first debate put Obama and the media are in such a free fall was the media protected Obama for 8 years and McCain who was burdened by a years of anti-Bush hammering was not able to prove that an unknown was lying about his abilities. For 4 years the media covered for him, he gave no real press conferences where he was force to answer to the people and the teleprompter jokes were considered rantings of rightwing radicals. Then in the current campaign, the media continued to inject itself into every aspect of the campaign trying to shape the narratives, not report on them. This campaign will be remembered as the "What about the Gaffes" campaign. The first debate showed that for the first time in Obama's life, he was forced to explain his capabilities, his performance and his achievements or lack thereof. And he looked like a complete moron, even to his friends. That was the real Barack Obama. Welcome to our shared national nightmare.
Without the objectivity of the media to point out the ridiculous notion that a President who spent nearly a month denying that the biggest terrorist attack by AL Qaeda was neither pre-planned or an act of terror, let alone associated in anyway with Al Qaeda, is somehow protected by a single remark in a speech that referred to 911 as terrorism, is so utterly ridiculous that it risks making anyone that justifies the innity with debate as somehow a nit picker.
Wouldn't it be easier to just say, here are the 978 times the governemnt claimed it was not pre-planned and it was solely a spontaneous reaction to the actions in Cairo and the video by Sam Becile,..and here is the one remark by Obama which was not what he says it was.
SO let the Nit Picking begin. Here is the quote from the Rose Garden about "acts of terror":
Of course, yesterday was already a painful day for our nation as we marked the solemn memory of the 9/11 attacks. We mourned with the families who were lost on that day. I visited the graves of troops who made the ultimate sacrifice in Iraq and Afghanistan at the hallowed grounds of Arlington Cemetery, and had the opportunity to say thank you and visit some of our wounded warriors at Walter Reed. And then last night, we learned the news of this attack in Benghazi.
As Americans, let us never, ever forget that our freedom is only sustained because there are people who are willing to fight for it, to stand up for it, and in some cases, lay down their lives for it. Our country is only as strong as the character of our people and the service of those both civilian and military who represent us around the globe.
No acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this great nation, alter that character, or eclipse the light of the values that we stand for. Today we mourn four more Americans who represent the very best of the United States of America. We will not waver in our commitment to see that justice is done for this terrible act. And make no mistake, justice will be done.
First paragraph he discusses the "Subject" of the acts of terror remark. He mentions 911 victims, those that died in Afghanistan and Iraq, Wounded warriors in hospitals and then he mentions "the attack" in Benghazi.
Is he claiming that all of the above people were victims of terrorism at the hands of Al Qaeda? No. Did all the dead of Iraq die at the hands of Al Qaeda. Obama and his friends claimed Al Qaeda had nothing to do with Iraq.
Second Paragraph he clarifies the connection between these groups. He is explaining that not just our soldiers, but civilians or bureaucrats take risks too and they might die in a number of different ways, especially if they are trying to work in the middle east in non-military ways, like Ambassador Stevens. You might die at the hands of Al Qaeda terrorists like those on 911, you might die in Iraq by non terrorist acts, you might be wounded in Afghanistan by non-terrorist acts, you might be killed in a spontaneous eruption of violence which is not terrorism or pre-planned, but shares with terrorism the fact that it is a reaction to a misunderstanding of our character, which I Barack Obama am the living embodiment of and George Bush is not.
Third paragraph, he finally says "No acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this great nation,..."
If he wanted to say Benghazi was an act of terror, he would have, but he didn't. He gave a list of ways that Americans are injured or killed in the Mid East some as a result of "acts of terror" and some not, then he went on to convey whether it is a minor misunderstanding, a stupid war in Iraq, or even the most significant and horrific such as the 911 terrorist attacks that he had just discussed mourning over,...that none of these, the minor or the major will diminish our efforts to protect you.
The very essence of that statement is a lie. It is clear he is not calling Benghazi an act of terror, he is merely trying to elevate Stevens' sacrifice to a more meaningful level, by associating it with these other events, but the truth is, he died because of the bumbling of Obama and his misguided policies.
Worse than that, he is trying to rekindle the narrative of the Osama Bin Laden hit, by claiming he will hunt these people down. So far Sam Becile was the first villain to be captured and he is still in a Wen Ho lee style cell somewhere for making a crappy youtube video.
So he developed a comic book narrative that if you kill the Arch villain, that the henchmen slither down the drains of the sewers of Gotham and disappear. He killed Osama Bin Laden, so the war is over, or as Clinton used to say, the Russian missiles are no longer pointing at us, so we can cash in our chips for a peace dividend. The Arab Spring was the carrot side of the con job meant to convince us that Obama killed Al Qaeda and Democracies based on a model of "Ghandi and Martin Luther King" has emerged in the ashes of the now ended war.
The bizarre thing is, the narrative of the OBL hit is now being dredged up and imitated in a lame attempt to disguise how ineffective the killing of Osama Bin Laden really was in destroying Al Qaeda, which is very much alive and well in North Africa, because it killed Ambassador Stevens. This is the ultimate post modern foreign policy President. This is not wag the dog, its wag the snake, because the snake is all tail and no reality.
We have a President who claimed Bush was not fighting a war, he was using it as a distraction to steal valuable natural resources from people of color with a religion that Obama understands because he could see Islam from his front porch when he was 7. He claimed he would give sermons on the mount in Cairo and the arms would be laid down and liberty would "Let my people go" from Egypt and the Middle East would be a beacon of freedom.
This narrative had millions of holes in it, but had not really been covered by a main stream media that didn't want to point to trouble in paradise, unless the response to it created an opportunity for their candidate. Just like in Rwanda, the media admited later it feared a Black Hawk Down scenario of bad press for Clinton, if a sharper focus on genocide created a drumbeat for action, so they looked the other way.
So in Benghazi and Cairo, the warning signs were all there. Obama keeps sending out the word, don't use the word terror, don't act like the war on terror is still under way, lay low. Just as they laughed at Bush's Red, Yellow, Orange warning system, Obama was sending a message around the world not to worry, there is no danger. So many responded accordingly. Apparently those on the ground in Libya did not think it was peaceful, but those closer to the political center of the US government denied them the protection they requested.
In a previous attack in Benghzai, a breach in the containment wall was blown open big enough for an assault squad to enter. This would not have been a run of the mill security breach. In a country Obama where Obama had waged war just months ago, to have a consulate attacked in this manner would have absolutely made its way in to the Presidents Security briefing, which we know he has been criticized for not receiving in person while on campaign. So Obama either did or should have known of the security threat to terrorism at this exact location, assuming his briefing procedures had not been compromised for political reasons. This should have prompted him personally to comment on security there prior to Sept 11. He apparently did not. Because the requests were denied.
What we had on Sept 11 was a major terror attack on an Ambassador by Al Qaeda affiliates. Worse yet, Obama had met with Gamal Islamiya in the White House about the release of Abdel Rahman,... and this attack was spawned by Rahman's brigade. So Obama tried negotiating and didn't recognize it was the old Jihadi tradition of offering your opponent mercy before killing him.
Obama's entire post modern theme that Al Qaeda is dead and the radical islamists are now Ben Franklin in a Hijab is unraveling. It should be noted, when Obama cried out that Romney was accusing he and his staff of lying for political purposes and that he was extremely offended, Romney actually had not. But Obama's "accustaion" against Romney was ironic. Obama had just minutes before accusedRomney of politicizing the event, which by his standard is unpatriotic and further more gave Romney an opening for the next debate. Romney can now say in the next debate, "You accused me of accusing Susan Rice of lying for political reasons, you accused me of accusing you of lying for political reasons on the terrorist attack in Benghazi that caused the attack on Amb. Stevens that resulted in his torture and death and mutilation, and you claimed that I was using your many mistatements of fact on this act of terror and your inconsistent remarks and those of your staff and the circular blame that has circulated around your disoriented White House and characterizing all of that "Stuff" as a cynical attempt on your part to distract away from your failed policies in the region and your negligence for purely political reasons that are designed to keep your white knuckled clutches on the reins of power,...
....but I never accused you of that.
Here is what the attack did prove:
Al Qaeda is still alive and on offense
AL Qaeda is operating openly in Egypt and may actually be moving its headquarters there if Morsi continues to look the other way
If Egypt (and its neighbor Libya) becomes the new Afghanistan that means Al Qaeda now operates out of a sophisticated urbanized nation that controls the Suez canal, borders Israel, has a sophisticated military, is 300 miles from Italy and plays a leadership role amongst Political thinkers throughout Islam.
The Arab Spring never was
Obama is mostly annoyed with Israel and not very concerned with their existential fears
The Middle East is about to get much worse than we have ever seen it and much of the blame rests on Obama's doorstep
Obama is completely unequipped mentally and philosophically to respond to the shit storm that is about to hit us, and his ideological stubbornness means he never will, even if bodies keep landing at Andrews
Obama's White House meetings with Al Qaeda affiliate, Gamal Islamiya regarding the release of Abdel Rahman show he is ignorant of the true identity of who is running the Egyptian Government and is at the very least may be naively handing our enemies the opportunity to threaten Europe directly and isolate America.
So did he declare this an Al Qaeda terrorism attack on Sept 12? No. Has he ever declared a true act of terror as such within 24 hours? Never. Not Once. George Bush did. Even Clinton did. Obama as amatter of policy, never has and now his Chickens have come home to roost.
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