If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
For the past few years, as a special thank you to our service members and their families, I've held a contest just for military spouses. It turned out to be an incredibly rewarding experience.
It's not unheard of for journalists to reveal source identities if it's proven that that person badly misled a reporter or passed along bogus information. Some observers think that's what happened in the case of the Benghazi talking points.
One of my biggest disappointments with President Obama's transition to his second term was the announcement that Holder would be staying on, instead of turning the Justice Department over to someone else. I don't personally dislike Holder (I've never met the man), but I do strongly question his priorities during his time as the nation's Attorney General.
How does one conduct herself each day among such partisanship, isolation, domestic and international disasters, and what seems like the daily fracturing not only of our nation, but also of our relationship with other nations? It's been a harrowing week trying to figure all of this out -- here's what I've established.
When congressional Republicans complete manipulating the Benghazi tragedy, it will be time for the virtually silent Senate Intelligence Committee to take up three major issues that have been largely ignored.
The point isn't to have one, it's to make it quickly and efficiently and then pin it on the president. To exploit a scandal for scandal's sake. Because scandals are the only way to shrink our deficit, improve our financial outlook, and allow the Dow to set all sorts of records.
Sometimes in the face of national tragedy, politics should take a backseat. The hypocrisy of turning Benghazi into a deliberate cover-up scandal is preposterous at a time when the nation faces so many serious problems.
So, the media needs another food-fight story, and, if there is no real one, just allow themselves to be sucked in by right-wing propaganda. Hence, Benghazi. Again.
In the Iraq war 4500 American soldiers died, not to mention the tens of thousands of others, including Iraqis, killed or maimed. Yet Washington never witnessed such outrage and a quest for the truth from Republicans, whose disingenuous motives on Benghazi are now utterly transparent.
The U.S. Justice Department's secret seizure of two months of phone records for reporters and editors of the Associated Press is a reckless violation of the First Amendment. There is nothing more sacred in the American democracy than freedom of the press.
Like Whitewater, look at how the Benghazi production now comes complete with dubious claims about whistleblowers (and their unreliable advocate), controversial talking points, and leaked Congressional testimony used to whip up media anticipation.
Efforts to manufacture a controversy surrounding this tragedy are not only disingenuous, they are dangerous because they take our eye off the ball and divert attention from where it should be: protecting the American people and those who bravely serve our country overseas.
Obama poses an excellent question: Why put together a spin program that will fall apart in a few days? For that is exactly what happened.
What is most troubling, though not surprising, is how many in the major media have legitimized these crass and partisan Republican attacks and the manner they are being carried out in hearings that are organized so unfairly they resemble the proceedings of a one-party Republican state
