The tire tracks from the bus Barack Obama drove over the U.S. intelligence community continue leading to trouble for a president seen as trying to save his own political skin.
When Obama told “60 Minutes” on Sunday that the rapid rise and spread of ISIS could be blamed on intelligence failure, that set off a firestorm of angry reaction. Intelligence officials adamantly defend their expertise and actions, arguing that the blame is not theirs, but the president’s for failure to act on their repeated warnings.
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The Washington Times reports that the White House has been given detailed briefings on the activities of the Islamic State and their relentless spread of terror for well over a year.
U.S. policy leaders, including President Obama, were repeatedly warned for more than a year by the U.S. intelligence community that the Islamic State terror group was gaining significant strength in Syria and was on the verge of seizing territory deep inside Iraq, where the military was struggling to respond.
The private assessments, which were confirmed to The Washington Times on Monday, conflict with Mr. Obama’s claim on national television over the weekend that America’s spies had underestimated the rise and capabilities of the Islamic State and had overestimated the Iraqi military’s ability and will to fight the group.
And a new study offers a reason for Obama’s lack of awareness about the emergence of ISIS — he wasn’t paying attention…he was disinterested and detached. President Obama, says this damning report, has skipped over half his daily intelligence briefings.
Via breitbart.com:
A new Government Accountability Institute (GAI) report reveals that President Barack Obama has attended only 42.1% of his daily intelligence briefings (known officially as the Presidential Daily Brief, or PDB) in the 2,079 days of his presidency through September 29, 2014.
The GAI report also included a breakdown of Obama’s PDB attendance record between terms; he attended 42.4% of his PDBs in his first term and 41.3% in his second.
In a revealing analysis on americanthinker.com, Thomas Lifson argues that Obama’s apparent attempt to shift blame from his own inaction to the inadequacies of his intelligence experts will backfire and be a “disaster” for his presidency.
Obama has now handed his political opponents a big issue. He has failed in his duty to protect America.
Once the impression is created that Obama is irresponsible in his duty to protect us, it will be very hard indeed for him to escape a degree of scorn, particularly if the threat from ISIS and domestic terrorists (including lone wolves who may not be done with beheadings) continues to produce dramatic images.