The backlash against Boko Haram

The backlash against Boko Haram

Michael Rubin | Commentary Magazine

May 08, 2014

Reuters

Article Highlights

• What Boko Haram is doing is rooted in Islam, albeit an archaic & twisted interpretation of it far from the mainstream Tweet This
  
• Boko Haram’s actions have become too much for even many extremists to accept Tweet This
  
• Perhaps out of this horror, Nigeria can turn a corner. Tweet This
  

When Islamist terrorists seized more than 1,000 school children in Beslan, North Ossetia, abusing and ultimately murdering hundreds, the international response was pure and utter revulsion. Chechen and Daghestani separatists—and even many Islamists—could stomach no excuse for the action and rejected the religious justification espoused by the mostly Ingush and Chechen terrorists. Indeed, rather than enhance the Chechen or Daghestani causes, the Beslan massacre marked the end of most remaining international and Islamist sympathy for their struggles against a brutal and abusive Russian regime.
If there is any silver lining to the horror occurring in northeastern Nigeria, it is that Boko Haram’s kidnapping of several hundred Nigerian school girls—and the leader’s threats to sell them off like chattel—may be a bridge to far for even those sympathetic to more militant strains of Islamism. And make no mistake, what Boko Haram is doing is rooted in Islam, albeit an archaic and twisted interpretation of it far from the mainstream. Indeed, anyone who denies the religious component has simply ignored the statement of Abubakar Shekau, Boko Haram’s leader and the man apparently responsible for the kidnapping, in his claim of responsibility:
My brethren in Islam, I am greeting you in the name of Allah like he instructed we should among Muslims. Allah is great and has given us privilege and temerity above all people. If we meet infidels, if we meet those that become infidels according to Allah, there is no any talk except hitting of the neck; I hope you chosen people of Allah are hearing. This is an instruction from Allah. It is not a distorted interpretation it is from Allah himself. This is from Allah on the need for us to break down infidels, practitioners of democracy, and constitutionalism, voodoo and those that are doing western education, in which they are practicing paganism…
We know what is happening in this world, it is a Jihad war against Christians and Christianity. It is a war against western education, democracy and constitution. We have not started, next time we are going inside Abuja; we are going to refinery and town of Christians. Do you know me? I have no problem with Jonathan. This is what I know in Quran. This is a war against Christians and democracy and their constitution, Allah says we should finish them when we get them.
According to SITE Monitoring, however, a subscription service which monitors and translates Islamist (and other extremist) websites, Boko Haram’s actions have become too much for even many extremists to accept: It is one thing to talk about religious war in theory; it is quite another thing to see the human toll when it is implemented in practice. Let us hope that the girls are rescued with minimal casualties, both among the hostages and those seeking to free them. And let us also hope that men like Abubakar Shekau will soon join the masterminds of the Beslan attack in hell. But, most of all, let us hope that those who until now might have been following and–in  the case of Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar–funding these radical preachers will see in these Boko Haram actions not righteousness, but true evil. Perhaps out of this horror, Nigeria can turn a corner.

Uncloaking the layers of the Benghazi tragedy

By Jennifer Oliver O'Connell, Communities Digital News

• Commentary
• Conservative
• Politics

May 2, 2014

LOS ANGELES, May 2, 2014 — While Democrat Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi continued to try to dismiss the Benghazi investigation as a Republican “diversion”, another layer has been uncovered from the tragic September 11, 2012 Embassy attack that killed four Americans, including Security Officer Sean Smith, former Navy Seal Tyrone Woods, and U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens.
Two emails have emerged in the past 48 hours that give strong credence to the fact that the Obama administration knew immediately that Ansar al-Shariah, a radical Islamic faction was responsible for the attack on the Benghazi embassy. But President Barack Obama, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, then-UN Ambassador Susan Rice, and other officials pushed the story that the attack was spontaneous, and directly the result of an anti-Islamic YouTube video.
This tome strained credulity two years ago, yet the media, elected officials, and much of the American public swallowed it hook, line, and sinker.
During the past two years, the House Oversight Committee subpoenaed documents and called witnesses, including Secy. Clinton, who did what she has done all of her political career: obfuscate and feign outrage — not necessarily in that order. Despite damning testimony from Diplomatic Security Officer Eric Nordstrom, and Foreign Service Officer Gregory Hicks, the Oversight Committee did nothing more than play political Yahtzee, while failing to make any inroads into who was accountable for four American deaths, and who was responsible for no one coming to their aid.
Charles Woods, father of Tyrone Woods, and Patricia Smith, mother of Sean Smith have cried out for truth and answers from the beginning. Instead, they had Democrat representatives walk out on their testimony before the Oversight Committee on September 19, 2013. Those directly intertwined in the cover up: State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland, Susan Rice, and others got promoted. We all know that former Secy. of State Clinton is on a speaking tour to promote her upcoming memoir, while flirting with running for President in 2016.
The State Department and the Obama administration managed to successfully conceal both documents from the public; until now. Finally truth has its pants on.
Conservative watchdog Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of Information (FOIA) lawsuit against the State Department on June 21, 2013. Through this lawsuit, the organization was able to obtain 41 new Benghazi-related State Department documents; among these documents was one smoking gun email reflecting that White House Deputy Strategic Communications Adviser Ben Rhodes and other administration PR officials attempted to orchestrate a campaign to portray the Benghazi consulate terrorist attack as being “rooted in an Internet video, and not a failure of policy,” along with crafted Q&A coaching for then-U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice to run with on her September 16, 2012 Sunday-shows tour a week after the attack.
According to Judicial Watch, “The Rhodes email was sent on Friday, September 14, 2012, at 8:09 p.m. with the subject line: ‘RE: PREP CALL with Susan, Saturday at 4:00 pm ET.’ The documents show that the ‘prep’ was for Amb. Rice’s Sunday news show appearances to discuss the Benghazi attack.
The document lists as a ‘Goal’: “To underscore that these protests are rooted in and Internet video, and not a broader failure or policy.”
The email also shows the top administration officials who received the Rhodes memo, among them: White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, Deputy Press Secretary Joshua Earnest, then-White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer, then-White House Deputy Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri, then-National Security Council Director of Communications Erin Pelton, Special Assistant to the Press Secretary Howli Ledbetter, and then-White House Senior Advisor and political strategist David Plouffe.
All the King’s horses and all the King’s men knew about the web of deception. No plausible deniability here.
Oversight Committee member and Utah Rep. Jason Chafetz released the second email on Thursday. Sharyl Attkisson, former CBS investigative reporter who has been one of the few who has questioned the administration’s narrative and has rallied for a true investigation into the attack wrote:

“The private, internal communication directly contradicts the message that President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice and White House press secretary Jay Carney repeated publicly over the course of the next several weeks.
“They often maintained that an anti-Islamic YouTube video inspired a spontaneous demonstration that escalated into violence.
“The email is entitled ‘Libya update from Beth Jones.’ Jones was then-Assistant Secretary of State to Hillary Clinton. According to the email, Jones spoke to Libya’s Ambassador at 9:45am on Sept. 12, 2012 following the attacks.
“’When [the Libyan Ambassador] said his government suspected that former Qaddafi regime elements carried out the attacks, I told him the group that conducted the attacks—Ansar Al Sharia—is affiliated with Islamic extremists,’ Jones reports in the email.”

When asked about these new emails, Pelosi faux-whined to the reporter, “Benghazi, Benghazi, Benghazi… Why aren’t we talking about something else?”
After two years of outright lies, stonewalling, and attempts to ignore the calls for a special investigation, we move to a new attempt at cover up: Let’s talk about something else, anything else, but the failure of an administration that based its re-election strategy and denigrated its opponents with the supposed stellar foreign policy gains of President Obama and Hillary Clinton’s State Department.
All throughout the 2012 campaign President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden all but crowed that Al Qaeda was on the run. The Libyan embassy going up in flames on Sept. 11, 2012 laid waste to this, but with the willing assistance of the news media, the administration lied and deflected attention to a video that had barely been seen prior to the attack. The video’s maker, Nakoula Basseley Nakoula spent a year in jail on a supposed parole violation—very few have said a word about the violation of Nakoula’s free speech rights.
What most anyone with a moderate level of intelligence and observation knew, is now clearly evident from the emails: the Obama administration knew the attack was terror, but still coached U.N. Ambassador (now U.N. National Security Adviser—what a crock) Susan Rice to lie and push an anti-Islamic video narrative in order to maintain the illusion that Obama had vanquished terrorism in the Middle East. So delusional.
The Washington Examiner reports that House Speaker John Boehner is “furious” about the Obama administration withholding this information, and is calling a vote to mount a select committee to investigate Benghazi. Gee, Mr. Speaker, only took you two years to find your outrage! What exactly did Speaker Boehner expect? One would think he would know by now that he is dealing with a smoke-and-mirrors presidency that thrives on subterfuge and deceit, and will always attempt to place themselves in the best political light at the exclusion of all else—even Americans dying.
However, here’s the proof that Boehner is actually serious: South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy has reportedly been named to chair the select committee. Rep. Gowdy is the real deal. An effective and successful prosecutor in his life before the House, he has been a vocal and consistent critic of the Obama administration’s handling of Benghazi’s aftermath, and its subsequent investigation. His tenacity, and his innate skill at plowing through the weeds to get to the wheat is what is needed to finally uncover the full truth about Benghazi.
Jeff Goldstein at the Protein Wisdom blog hammers the nail:

“It took two years for the leadership to empanel a single committee of seasoned investigators to look into what we’ve all known from the outset was a lie and a fraud being perpetuated on the American public. We knew a cover-up was being launched before our eyes, and we stood by in amazement as a man was imprisoned and both the President and the next would-be Democrat nominee spoke over the flag-draped caskets of the fallen about a video they knew had nothing to do with the attacks.
“All as part of a re-election strategy.”

Not only is it a tragedy that four Americans died needlessly, it is an even greater tragedy that it happened because of purely political motivations. Layer on top of that the tragedy that the families of the fallen, along with attentive Americans, have been crying for justice, but the administration and both Houses have dithered and dismissed it, while a complacent and sycophant media worked to ignore it and cover it up.
Let this be the end of these tragedies, and the beginning of truth. It is long overdue.


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Holder’s deputy for public corruption investigations stuns congressman; doesn’t know who’s in charge of IRS probe

May 10, 2014 by Joe Saunders 5 Comments

A hearing into federal policies on marijuana enforcement turned turned into high drama Friday when a Texas Republican used the chance to try to find out basic facts about the Justice Department’s investigation of the IRS targeting scandal – and learned nothing.
Under sharp questioning by Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Texas, David O’Neil, an associate deputy attorney general whose responsibilities include public corruption investigations, was repeatedly unable to provide basic information about the IRS probe, including who is in charge of it and how many agents under his command are involved.
A cynic might think there wasn’t any investigation at all.
Jordan sounds like a cynic.
“The DOJ investigation has been a joke, as evidenced by Mr. O’Neil’s unfamiliarity with even the most basic details of the work being done by the division he oversees,” Jordan told the Daily Mail.

Daughter, 14, confronts school board after dad
was arrested over sex book: ‘I don’t feel safe’

The IRS scandal broke a year ago, when Lois Lerner, then head of the IRS division for tax-exempt organizations, admitted the IRS had targeted conservative groups for additional scrutiny when they sought tax-exempt status in the run-up to President Obama’s re-election in 2012.
Groups with names that indicated they opposed the president had their applications delayed, which hindered their political effectiveness. Groups whose names indicated they were sympathetic to Democrat positions were spared the extra attention.
Since her admission, Lerner has invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination and has been cited for contempt of Congress and congressional Democrats and their liberal media allies have tried to bury the story — along with the terrorist attack in Benghazi that killed four Americans — as a “phony scandal.”
As Jordan made clear by using the marijuana enforcement hearing to press the case, Republicans aren’t letting the issue die.
And as a subcommittee chairman on Rep. Darrell Issa’s Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, he’s in a position to keep it alive.
“We are talking about the IRS violating the First Amendment rights of Americans, and we deserve a real investigation that helps us deliver justice,” he told the Mail.

50 dead bodies found in town ravaged by Boko Haram, 100 likely dead in attack; 276 kidnapped schoolgirls still missing

50 dead bodies found in town ravaged by Boko Haram, 100 likely dead in attack; 276 kidnapped schoolgirls still missing

South Africans protest in solidarity against the abduction three weeks ago of hundreds of schoolgirls in Nigeria by the Muslim extremist group Boko Haram and what protesters said was the failure of the Nigerian government and international community to rescue them, during a march to the Nigerian Consulate in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Thursday, May 8, 2014. (photo credit: AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
The celebrification of the these kidnapped girls is bringing awareness of Boko Haram to the uninformed masses. That is a good thing. This kidnapping is just the latest in an unending jihad against non-Muslims in Nigeria. And it’s not just Nigeria. It’s Ethiopia, Kenya, Central African Republic, Thailand, Egypt, etc.
We must utterly destroy the ideology that incites these devout savages to jihad.

“50 bodies found in town ravaged by Boko Haram
Nigerian officials say 100 likely dead in attack; 276 kidnapped schoolgirls still missing,” By Haruna Umar, The Times of Israel, May 8, 2014
Nigerian officials say 100 likely dead in attack; 276 kidnapped schoolgirls still missing
BAUCHI, Nigeria (AP) — Residents of a Nigerian town attacked by Boko Haram criticized security forces for failing to protect them despite warnings that the Islamic militants were nearby. At least 50 bodies have been recovered, many horribly burned, in the town.
The attack on Gamboru, in remote northeastern Nigeria near the border with Cameroon, is part of the Islamic militants’ campaign of terror that included the kidnapping of teenaged girls from a school, 276 of whom remain missing and believed held by Boko Haram in the vast Sambisa Forest in northeastern Nigeria.
The death toll from the Monday afternoon attack in Gamboru was initially reported by a senator to be as many as 300, but a security official said it is more likely to be around 100. Some Gamboru residents said bodies were recovered from the debris of burned shops around the town’s main market, which was the focus of the attack.
The bodies were found after the market reopened on Wednesday as health workers, volunteers and traders searched for missing people, said Gamboru resident Abuwar Masta. He said most of the bodies were burned beyond recognition. Some of the victims were traders from Chad and Cameroon, he said.
“It seems they hid in the shops in order not (to) be killed while fleeing,” Masta said Wednesday. “Unfortunately, several explosives were thrown into the market.”
Masta and other traders said that some villagers had warned the security forces of an impending attack after insurgents were seen camping in the bush near Gamboru.
The kidnapping of the schoolgirls on April 15 in the town of Chibok have sparked accusations that the Nigerian government is not doing enough to stop the militants. Boko Haram has killed more than 1,500 people so far this year as part of their campaing to impose Islamic law on Africa’s most populous nation, which has 170 million people equally divided between Christian and Muslim.
Outrage over the missing girls and the government’s failure to rescue them brought angry Nigerian protesters into the streets this week, an embarrassment for the government of President Goodluck Jonathan which had hoped to showcase the country’s emergence as Africa’s largest economy as it hosted the Africa meeting of the World Economic Forum, the continent’s version of Davos. That meeting is ongoing in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, which also has been the scene recently of two bomb blasts blamed on Boko Haram.
Nigeria’s military said in a statement Thursday that the armed forces are “focused on the task of rescuing the abducted girls and that the war on Boko Haram “will be effectively prosecuted.”
On Thursday the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Fatou Bensouda, said acts such as the mass abduction of girls “shock the conscience of humanity” and could constitute crimes that fall within the jurisdiction of The Hague-based court.
“No stone should be left unturned to bring those responsible for such atrocious acts to justice either in Nigeria or at the ICC,” she said in a statement.
The homegrown terror group was largely contained to the northern part of Nigeria before expanding its reach with the help of al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, the terrorist network’s affiliate in West Africa, which trained Boko Haram fighters in its camps in southern Somalia, beginning in 2010.
Although Boko Haram has killed thousands of people — Christians as well as Muslims — over the years in a campaign of bombings and massacres, the group’s mass abduction of schoolgirls appears to have galvanized global attention and prompted offers of security assistance from foreign countries to help rescue the girls.
The US announced on Tuesday it was sending personnel and equipment to help Nigerian security forces.
Jonathan confirmed that he has accepted the American assistance, which the Pentagon said Wednesday will include communications, logistics and intelligence planning, but will not include any military operations. Britain and China said Nigeria had accepted their offers of help, and France said it was sending in a “specialized team” to help with search and rescue of the girls.
The office of the United Nations spokesman in New York said Jonathan on Thursday accepted UN chief Ban Ki-moon’s offer to send a high-level representative to Nigeria to discuss how the UN can support efforts to tackle the country’s “internal challenges.”

The post 50 dead bodies found in town ravaged by Boko Haram, 100 likely dead in attack; 276 kidnapped schoolgirls still missing appeared first on Pamela Geller, Atlas Shrugs.

Hillary Clinton Protested Designation of Boko Haram as Terrorist Group

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by Warner Todd Huston 9 May 2014 post a comment

Hillary Clinton refused to put Boko Haram...

Back in 2012 when Clinton was secretary of state, she and the state department ignored a request from the justice department, the CIA, and dozens of senators and representatives to put Boko Haram on the official list...

While Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton fought hard against officially designating the Islamists of Boko Haram as a terror group—placing her in the camp of far-left activist group MoveOn.org.

Josh Rogin at The Daily Beast reports that other agencies in the Obama Administration were frustrated by Clinton's stonewalling on the issue:

[Clinton's] own State Department refused to place Boko Haram on the list of foreign terrorist organizations in 2011, after the group bombed the U.N. headquarters in Abuja. The refusal came despite the urging of the Justice Department, the FBI, the CIA, and over a dozen senators and congressmen.
“The one thing she could have done, the one tool she had at her disposal, she didn’t use. And nobody can say she wasn’t urged to do it. It’s gross hypocrisy,” said a former senior U.S. official who was involved in the debate. “The FBI, the CIA, and the Justice Department really wanted Boko Haram designated, they wanted the authorities that would provide to go after them, and they voiced that repeatedly to elected officials.”

The African terror outfit is again in the news last month by kidnapping and selling into sexual slavery upwards of 250 Nigerian girls. The group did this because these girls dared to go to school and gain an education, something Islamic fundamentalists oppose. The name "Boko Haram" means "Western education is sinful."
Clinton, between myriad campaign-esque public appearances nationwide, released a statement this week saying that the abduction of the girls by the Islamist terror group was "abominable, it’s criminal, it’s an act of terrorism and it really merits the fullest response possible, first and foremost from the government of Nigeria."
Clinton did not explain why she opposed putting Boko Haram on the list of terrorist organizations in 2011 when she was Secretary of State.
A 2012 petition hosted by MoveOn.org may illuminate the rationale behind Hillary's reluctance. The goal of the petition, posted by self-proclaimed Africa expert William Minter, was to convince President Obama not to call Boko Haram a terrorist group.
The petition called designating Boko Haram a terror group a "counterproductive mistake with far-reaching negative consequences for both Americans and Nigerians."
In the explanation of why it was "counterproductive," the petition said that giving Boko Haram the legitimacy of being called a terror group would actually help the terrorists.
Designating them as official terrorists, the petition says, "would increase rather than diminish the threat from Boko Haram. It would give the group additional visibility and credibility among international terrorist networks. It would increase the chances that the group would direct its attacks against U.S. targets."
Then, in classic blame-the-victim mode, the petition then claimed that it would only "reinforce militarization" of the Nigerian government as it sought to respond to the terrorists.
After Hillary left the State Department, in November of 2013 her successor, John Kerry, finally did put the group on the official U.S. terror list.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com

Judicial Watch: Obama Administration Still Withholding Documents about Benghazi Attack

Judicial Watch: Obama Administration Still Withholding Documents about Benghazi Attack

MAY 06, 2014

New State Department Document Argues Releasing Benghazi Documents Would “Chill” Government Deliberations – Including Internal WH Discussion about Whether US Officials Knew Benghazi Was a Terrorist Attack Within 24 Hours 

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released a 17-page draft Vaughn Index document obtained from the U.S. Department of State on May 1, revealing that the Obama administration is still refusing to provide the full details of how top officials arrived at the now-discredited talking points released to the public following the deadly assault on the U.S. Mission in Benghazi, Libya. The new documents, containing more than 50 paragraphs of justifications to withhold information, were obtained in response to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Action (FOIA) lawsuit (Judicial Watch, Inc., v. U.S. Department of State, (Civil Action No. 13-cv-00951 (EGS)) filed on June 21, 2013.
A Vaughn Index is a document prepared by a federal agency to justify and detail the withholding of material from public disclosure.  The State Department sent the Benghazi draft Vaughn Index to Judicial Watch on May 1, 2014, in accordance with a court order of October 1, 2013.
The new document seeks to justify withholding internal exchanges within the Obama administration about the Benghazi attack dating back to a September 11, 2013, interagency email exchange containing redactions of an opinion offered on how to respond Benghazi attack updates. Though the State Department document repeatedly describes the material as “Unclassified” or “Sensitive But Unclassified,” it nonetheless justifies scores of extensive redactions and exemptions.
The majority of material in the draft Vaughn Index document pertains to “various drafts, and comments related to the drafts, of a proposed letter from United States Mission to the United Nations (USUN) Ambassador Susan Rice in response to various Congressional inquiries regarding the September 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. Mission in Benghazi, Libya.” The internal debate about the Rice response apparently continued until October 30, 2012. The material obtained by Judicial Watch included the following descriptions related to redacted or exempted material:

• Document C05415305 is a seven-page inter-agency e-mail exchange consisting of sixteen messages between State Department and other U.S. Government officials [Rhodes, Brennan, McDonough . . .] on September 27 and September 28, 2012, with an original subject line “FOX News: US officials knew Libya attack was terrorism within 24 hours, sources confirm.” Subsequent e-mail subject lines were redacted. The document was originally designated SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED. The Department withheld comments, opinions and assessments related to the formulation of a media strategy with respect to an ongoing sensitive matter under Exemption 5 pursuant to the deliberative process privilege…The information withheld under Exemption 5 is pre-decisional and deliberative in nature. The release of this information could reasonably be expected to chill the frank deliberations that occur when State Department and other U.S. Government officials are formulating public responses to address sensitive issues. The material is therefore exempt under FOIA Exemption 5, 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(5), pursuant to the deliberative process privilege.”

• Document C05415752 is a one-page intra-agency e-mail exchange, consisting of three messages, that is dated September 11, 2012, and bears the subject line “UPDATE: Clashes at U.S. consulate in eastern Libyan city (Reuters).” The Department withheld an opinion offered in response to an update regarding the Benghazi attack under FOIA Exemption 5 pursuant to the deliberative process privilege.

• Document C05415756 is a four-page intra-agency e-mail exchange consisting of ten messages between State Department officials, dated September 11, 2012, with the subject line “Libya update from Beth Jones.” [Jones was Assistant Secretary of State to Hillary Clinton at the time of the Benghazi attack.]

• Document C05415286 is a three-page intra-agency e-mail exchange, consisting of three messages, dated September 15, 2012, between various State Department personnel. This document … gives a readout and comments on an internal video conference held by U.S. Government officials on September 15, which discussed the security situation in parts of the Islamic world in the wake of a controversial film on the Prophet Mohammed.

• Document C05415951 is a three-page intra-agency e-mail exchange, consisting of six messages, between State Department and other U.S. Government officials, dated September 28, 2012 and originally designated UNCLASSIFIED. The subject line of the first five messages is “Statement by the Director of Public Affairs for National Intelligence Shawn Turner on the intelligence related to the terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya.”

• Document C05415969 is a three-page intra-agency e-mail exchange, consisting of six messages, dated September 29-30, 2012. The subject line of the messages is “Benghazi Draft Response Letter- v14.” The Department withheld candid comments, opinions and assessments made during internal strategy discussions related to the drafting of an official response letter under FOIA Exemption 5 pursuant to the deliberative process privilege.

• Documents C05416026 is a two-page intra-agency e-mail exchange, consisting of three messages, dated September 30, 2012. The subject lines of the three messages are, beginning with the earliest in time, “Press Recommendation on Libya,” “Draft Response – Vl 7,” and “[Redacted] version of the response letter.”

On Tuesday, April 29, Judicial Watch released explosive new Benghazi scandal documentsprecipitating a Washington firestorm that placed the Obama White House on the defensive and prompted House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) to call for a vote on a Select Committee on Benghazi. The documents included a newly declassified emailshowing then-White House Deputy Strategic Communications Adviser Ben Rhodes and other Obama administration public relations officials attempting to orchestrate a campaign to “reinforce” President Obama and to portray the Benghazi consulate terrorist attack as being “rooted in an Internet video, and not a failure of policy.”  Curiously, the State Department says that it released this document to Judicial Watch in its “discretion,” despite it being allegedly subject to deliberative process and other exemptions being used to secret other documents.
The State Department’s withholdings seem at odds with President Obama’s transparency pledges.  In one of his first official acts (on January 21, 2009, President Obama issued a memorandum on FOIA that includes the following:

Freedom of Information Act should be administered with a clear presumption: In the face of doubt, openness prevails. The Government should not keep information confidential merely because public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure, because errors and failures might be revealed, or because of speculative or abstract fears. Nondisclosure should never be based on an effort to protect the personal interests of Government officials at the expense of those they are supposed to serve. In responding to requests under the FOIA, executive branch agencies (agencies) should act promptly and in a spirit of cooperation, recognizing that such agencies are servants of the public.

All agencies should adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure, in order to renew their commitment to the principles embodied in FOIA, and to usher in a new era of open Government. The presumption of disclosure should be applied to all decisions involving FOIA.

“This document is a guide to the Obama administration’s Benghazi cover up,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.  “We will continue to battle this secrecy in court – transparency law requires the truth about government misconduct.”

Sign Up for Updates!

• Roy Phillips
  i have an idea: agree to investigate all the attacks against American embassies that took place under Bush43 and perhaps the Obama administration will then give you what you want in the way of documents relating to the Benghazi attack. You know:
  Like in 2002 when the US Consulate in the Karachi, Pakistan, was attacked
  and 10 were killed?
  Or in 2004 when the US embassy in Uzbekistan was attacked and two were
  killed and another nine injured?
  How about in 2004, when the US Consulate in Saudi Arabia was stormed and
  8 lost their lives?
  There is more: In 2006, armed men attacked the US Embassy in Syria and
  one was murdered.
  Then in 2007 a grenade was thrown at the US Embassy in Athens.
  In 2008, the US Embassy in Serbia was set on fire.
  In 2008, bombings in the US Embassy in Yemen killed 10.
  That does seem fair, doesn’t it?
  
• bittman
  Americans must keep pressing to find out the truth about Benghazi. We need to find out who issued the stand down order to the Military; we need to know who came up with the lie of the video and why Obama, Hillary, and Rice continued the lie for 2-3 weeks; we need to know where the President was since the Dude guy has already told us Obama was not in the Situation Room; and why haven’t the terrorists been caught in the past 19-20 months. Lastly, was our government really running guns to the Al Queda?
  
• Hermes Liberty
  It is very important that people realize that the US is under OCCUPATION, but armies of a special nature since they are Spirituals, but in no way miraculous or “extraterrestrials”. This Occupation, along with a supplemental Fight against US by a portion of our own Spirituals, is what complicate the panorama. Thorough explanations for very interested people could unearth a deep TRUTH and transcendent FACTS .
  
• Hermes Liberty
  Quite not the same group as those who use Boko Haram; but definitely of the same nature than that of hidden lurking Evildoers of a Spiritual rank and level; power thirsts who are the ones with whom Obama knowingly made a pact in order to access to power and presidency. These guys in turn use him in many ways, including their ATTEMPT TO KILL A HOLY MAN NAMED CHRIST, BY LETTING HIS NAMESAKE (AMBASSADOR CHRIS DIE; remember his multiple calls for the Ambassy’s reinforcement were ALL IGNORED!) THIS IS AN EVIL USE OF THE LAW OF CORRESPONDENCE “AS ABOVE, SO BELOW” WHICH HERE READS: “AS WITH CHRIS DEATH, SO BE IT WITH THE CHRIST” THEY ATTEMPTED IN VAIN, to kill. Well informed about these guys; the LAMBISTS shortcomings and countless evil doings. In fact, one of them, engineered my own arrest, the SAME DAY; SEPT 11 2012 for I am one of the opponents of their orientations, inclinations and misdeeds. OBAMA IS DEFINITELY RESPONSIBLE FOR HE KNOWS THESE GUYS AND IS THEIR “CHOSEN OR ANOINTED” (though they were ready to get rid of him for something grater) IN A WAY THAT DEFY ALL IMAGINATION. CLINTON is definitely responsible as well, even though at a much lesser extent than Obama. Highpolitics is to be investigated for this issue to become transparent.
  
• JP Gob
  “chill the frank deliberations” – ??? – in this particular case, wouldn’t that be a good idea? I mean, really, maybe government officials should feel a “chill” when having “frank deliberations” about how to lie to the American people. It isn’t like they were having “frank discussions” about how to improve security at the mission complex. They were having “frank deliberations” about how to cover up their own policy failures and America should want to “chill” those discussions because NO ONE SHOULD EVER BE COMFORTABLE HAVING FRANK DISCUSSIONS ABOUT COVERING UP THE TRUTH.
  

Muslim Brotherhood meets State Department officials? Maybe.

By Al Kamen

Mohamed Mursi, the head of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, gives a press conference Saturday in Cairo. (GIANLUIGI GUERCIA - AFP/GETTY IMAGES) In this town, reporters sometimes ask government briefers questions they can’t immediately answer. They’re often told, “I’ll get back to you on that.”
At some places, such as the Pentagon or the State Department, the briefers — or usually the people working for them — will indeed get back, within a few hours, via e-mail. At the White House, maybe they will, often they won’t.
But whether the response actually answers your question, well, that’s another story.
Take, for example, a question that a reporter asked State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland on Tuesday about whether department officials will be “meeting with the Muslim Brotherhood delegation that is currently in Washington?”(Some of the Egyptian delegation met Tuesday with White House officials, our colleague William Wan reported.)
Pretty straightforward, yes or no question. “We’ll get back to you,” she said.
And here’s the e-mailed response.
Answer: The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace is hosting a conference in Washington titled “Islamists in Power: Views from Within” on April 5.
Okay, that’s a fact. And some Brotherhood members will be there. So the answer is “yes”? Ah, not so fast.
Some of the conference participants will meet with State Department officials while in town,” the e-mail says. So the answer is surely yes? Maybe “Some of the conference participants”is some code for “Muslim Brotherhood.”
Deputy Secretary [William] Burns will meet with Vice President for Studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Dr. Marwan Muasher and some of the participants in the Carnegie conference on April 4, the answer continues.
Wait a minute. Muasher? Jordan’s former ambassador to Israel and to Washington and a former World Bank official? Hardly known to be a member of the Brotherhood. So maybe the answer is no?
Some of the Carnegie Endowment conference participants will also meet with Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment Robert Hormats and Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman, the answer concludes.
Any further questions?

By Al Kamen  |  01:27 PM ET, 04/04/2012

Tags:  Muslim Brotherhood, State Department, Pentagon, Marwan Muasher, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, William Burns, Robert Hormats, Jeffrey Feltman, Victoria Nuland, Al Kamen, Emily Heil, In the Loop