Last night on 60 Minutes, president Obama told another of his whoppers. This time he said that US intelligence agencies missed the rise of ISIS as a major force in Iraq and Syria. This was the supposed (and new) justification for his famous "jayvee" remark. According to Obama, it wasn't his own mistake, he just got poor information from the intelligence services.
This is the kind of lie that Obama told repeatedly in the past and got away with it. For example, we were supposed to believe that Obama knew nothing about the IRS targeting of conservative and Christian groups even though Obama's cabinet knew of the problem six months earlier and there was definitive proof that the White House Chief of Staff and other senior advisers knew all the details one month before the whole thing went public. Obama made that outlandish claim and no one said anything to contradict him.
Last night's lie, however, has been different. There has been immediate push back from the intelligence community and from some sections of the media. My favorite comment came from someone that the Daily Beast described as a former high ranking intelligence official. That person said that either Obama had not bothered to read all the intelligence briefings provided to him or he was just "bullshitting". Some choice! Comments from others in the know have not been quite as harsh, but the point is clear that Obama is just making this stuff up.
The truth is that Obama owns this mess. He chose to ignore ISIS. He chose to downplay the threat. He decided to do nothing for many months after the first major victories by ISIS as more and more Iraqi territory fell to the terrorists. America is now embroiled in a major military campaign as a direct result of Obama's failure to move against ISIS when it was much smaller and manageable. As I said, Obama owns this mess. He should at least have the honor to admit his own mistake and not blame it on others.
This is the kind of lie that Obama told repeatedly in the past and got away with it. For example, we were supposed to believe that Obama knew nothing about the IRS targeting of conservative and Christian groups even though Obama's cabinet knew of the problem six months earlier and there was definitive proof that the White House Chief of Staff and other senior advisers knew all the details one month before the whole thing went public. Obama made that outlandish claim and no one said anything to contradict him.
Last night's lie, however, has been different. There has been immediate push back from the intelligence community and from some sections of the media. My favorite comment came from someone that the Daily Beast described as a former high ranking intelligence official. That person said that either Obama had not bothered to read all the intelligence briefings provided to him or he was just "bullshitting". Some choice! Comments from others in the know have not been quite as harsh, but the point is clear that Obama is just making this stuff up.
The truth is that Obama owns this mess. He chose to ignore ISIS. He chose to downplay the threat. He decided to do nothing for many months after the first major victories by ISIS as more and more Iraqi territory fell to the terrorists. America is now embroiled in a major military campaign as a direct result of Obama's failure to move against ISIS when it was much smaller and manageable. As I said, Obama owns this mess. He should at least have the honor to admit his own mistake and not blame it on others.
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