Posted by
Bert Chapman on Wednesday, January 09, 2013 7:51:51 PM
We are seeing the bad consequences of reelecting Barack Obama in his second term cabinet nominations. Let's start with his nomination of John Brennan to be CIA Director. Leftists are whining about this because of his support for enhanced interrogation against Islamist terrorists. I'll happily give him a pass on this. However, I cannot overlook his providing excessive details on the operation killing Osama Bin Laden to Hollywood studios and other media outlets to bolster Obama's reelection. There's no telling what operational secrets may have been compromised by such indiscretion. Loose lips sink ships as a historic expression says.
Even more serious is Brennan's failure to put the words Islam and terrorism within geographic proximity of each other. Brennan seems to have fallen prey to the political correctness which refuses to recognize that Islam and terror go together like birds and a feather. We will be confronting Islamist terror as a premier intelligence problem and opportunity for the foreseeable future. We need a CIA director who understands that unequivocal reality and is courageous enough to say it and tackle it enthusiastically without worrying about offending Islamist sensitivities. The Senate needs to shoot Brennan down.
We now turn to the even more serious case of former Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel. Hagel is a legislator who fell prey to what the American Spectator calls The Strange New Respect award from an ostensibly conservative legislator who succumbs to the desire to pander to Washington's liberal media establishment. Hagel's criticism of the Iraq war, including doubting the wisdom of the 2007 troop surge, cast serious doubt on his credibility and staying power. Even more serious is his pandering to base anti-Semitic sentiment by blaming the so-called Jewish Lobby for preventing peace in the Mideast when the absence of peace is solely due to Islamist extremism. Hagel has also been frighteningly naive about the existential threat Iran's nuclear program poses to regional stability, Israel's survival, and American interests in many areas of the world. Hagel is in absolute denial about Iran's support for terrorism, its flagrant repression of its people, and even its apparent support for recent cyberterror attacks on financial institutions.
Stopping Iran's nuclear program needs to be among the Obama Administration's highest second term foreign policy and national security priorities. Yet Hagel seems to adhere to a "give peace a chance" mindset toward Tehran's mullahocracy. We've seen this regime in power for just over a third of a century and they are not interested in peaceful dialogue or reconciliation with us. They only understand and respect brute force and a power or combination of powers willing to use such force without mercy or regret against them. National Review once called Chuck Hagel the Ambassador for France due to his willingness to put other countries interests before America's. Defeating Hagel's confirmation is a wonderful opportunity for the Senate to show it cares more about defending American strategic interests than pandering to Islamist opinion.
Obama could have chosen more qualified and sensible individuals like former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy Brookings Institution scholar Michael O'Hanlon, or Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman to head the Pentagon. Unfortunately, Obama is absolutely lacking in sense and prudence. Like John Brennan, Chuck Hagel needs to be borked and Barack Obama needs to have egg on his face.