Monday, June 11, 2012

The man who couldn’t shut up



FLOPPING ACES
By: 

When it comes to national security secrets, the Obama administration is a sieve. That Obama is a narcissist has been well documented in this blog but Obama’s narcissism is endangering the national security of the United States. He just can’t shut up.
John McCain finally took notice of what many of us have been observing for some time- Obama leaking national security information:
Describing the string of recent intelligence leaks to news outlets as “disturbing” and “simply unacceptable,” Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., accused the White House of putting the president’s ambitions for another term in the Oval Office ahead of national security.
“A really disturbing aspect of this is that one could draw the conclusion from reading these articles that it is an attempt to further the president’s political ambitions for the sake of his re-election at the expense of our national security,” McCain said on the senate floor late today.
It’s gotten so bad that even democrats have had enough. Sen. Dianne Feinstein said it has to stop.
Obama’s ego bristled at the suggestion that he and his administration are leaking security information:
“The notion that my White House would purposefully release classified national security information is offensive. It’s wrong,” the president told reporters at the White House Friday. “People, I think, need to have a better sense of how I approach this office and how the people around me here approach this office.”
It’s pretty clear how he approaches that office- Wagyu beef, golf and super-rich Hollywood celebrities.
McCain’s criticism stems from the leak of the Obama kill list to the NY Times but that’s only one in a series of politically convenient leaks.
After the killing of Osama Bin Laden, Barack Obama and Joe Biden suffered from compulsive logorrhea. Defense Secretary Robert Gates was critical of the spectacle.
Robert Gates, the US defence secretary said that security will be increased around the elite military unit that killed Osama bin Laden, after warnings that government comments on the raid had made the troops vulnerable to retaliation.
Issuing a thinly veiled attack on White House officials, Robert Gates said that members of the Navy Seals team that carried out the raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan, had expressed fears for their safety.
“We are very concerned about the security of our troops, and also these elite units that are engaged in things like that,” Mr Gates told an audience of US marines.
“We are looking at what measures can be taken to pump up the security,” he said.
“As a result, there has been a consistent and effective effort to protect the identities of those who participated in the raid. I think that has to continue.”
Mr Gates revealed said senior officials watching the successful raid in the Situation Room on May 2 had agreed to keep “operational details” to a minimum.
“That all fell apart on Monday – the next day,” he said.
Then Obama and Biden went on a spree.
The Pentagon was evidently shocked when John Brennan, counter-terrorism adviser to President Barack Obama, held a press conference which provided various details of the raid, some of which turned out to be wrong.
A few days later Vice President Joe Biden, at a black tie dinner, was the first to confirm that Navy Seals had conducted the operation.
Various anonymous officials from different departments have since provided American journalists with details about the plot, including the number of the Navy Seals unit involved, the stealth technology used on the missions’ helicopters and the fact that the CIA had operated a safe house near to bin Laden’s compound.
Among the details spilled:
…the name of the courier who was followed to the compound in Pakistan, that retired Pakistani military officers were recruited by the CIA to man an observation post near the compound, where the FBI got a DNA sample from a bin Laden family member, the capabilities of our satellites, the base the helicopters used in Afghanistan and how they evaded Pakistani radar, the names, bases and training sites used by units on the mission, the number of SEALs involved, the weapons and equipment they carried, which Al Qaeda plots we learned of from data seized in the compound, which may tell Al Qaeda which plots we do not know about.
The Pakistani doctor who aided the US was outed and is now spending the next 30 years in jail.
The Obama administration then handed the AP every single detail of the raid, including the name of the dog.
A year later Obama arranged an “interview” with Brian Williams in the Situation Room- historically off limits to cameras- so Obama could allow America to bask in his glory.
A movie about the Bin Laden raid was commissioned by the White House to be released just prior to the coming election, and it’s suggested that Barack Obama is the real director. A SEAL Team 6 leader was made available for the movie.
In a statement, Judicial Watch said, “These documents, which took nine months and a federal lawsuit to disgorge from the Obama administration, show that politically-connected filmmakers were giving extraordinary and secret access to bin Laden raid information, including the identity of a Seal Team Six leader.” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton added, “It is both ironic and hypocritical that the Obama administration stonewalled Judicial Watch’s pursuit of the bin Laden death photos, citing national security concerns, yet seemed willing to share intimate details regarding the raid to help Hollywood filmmakers release a movie ‘perfectly timed to give a home-stretch boost’ to the Obama campaign.”
As tide of public opinion began to shift against him, Barack Obama released more national security information as a means of buttressing his support. First came the Obama-Personally-Selects-You-For-The-Kill-List leak to the NY Times, followed quickly by the news of the StuxNet cyberattack on Iran. The Obama administration leaked the fact that the US and Israel were behind the StuxNet worm.
Denials of leaking from Obama are mendacious at best, as Alexander Kazam points out:
Of course, we don’t know who exactly was in the room, but this a high-level national security meeting. The culprit may not be a “White House official,” but the leaks came out of a White House meeting — directly from the president’s top national-security advisers. This is not some guy in the bowels of the State Department passing e-mails to Julian Assange; it is one degree removed from the president.
This disclosure carries with it a very significant risk- by Pentagon definitions it’s an act of war.
Last weeks New York Times bombshell article by David Sanger claimed that President Obama secretly ordered the cyber-attacks on the computer systems that run Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities. The story tells of a significantly expanding American involvement in the sustained use of so called cyber-weapons against other nations using the “Stuxnet“ software. The story has caused quite the uproar. But what was missing from the story is something far more interesting, according to both The White House and Pentagon’s own definitions, a cyber-attack is to be considered “An act of war.” So by it’s own definition, are we at war?
Steve Rendall wrote a brief post at fair.org on the topic saying, “It would have been much more interesting had reporter David Sanger cited independent legal experts on whether such cyberattacks constitute acts of war. If they do, the White House program could have far more profound consequences than merely disrupting Iran’s nuclear program.”
The Pentagon clearly says it’s an act of war.
WASHINGTON—The Pentagon has concluded that computer sabotage coming from another country can constitute an act of war, a finding that for the first time opens the door for the U.S. to respond using traditional military force.
The Pentagon’s first formal cyber strategy, unclassified portions of which are expected to become public next month, represents an early attempt to grapple with a changing world in which a hacker could pose as significant a threat to U.S. nuclear reactors, subways or pipelines as a hostile country’s military.
And that makes this leak profoundly stupid.
The reasons for leaking this intel are obvious. Obama wanted Bin Laden’s head as a trophy for his re-election. He wanted everyone to know he was tough on terror, so he leaked the Kill List story. He wanted everyone to know he is tough on Iran so he leaked the StuxNet intel.
The denials are a painful reminder of the contempt Barack Obama has for the intelligence of Americans and on the part of his unthinking supporters, that contempt is well founded.
One is left with the distinct impression that Barack Obama believes nothing is more important that Barack Obama- not even the country under his stewardship. He’s played fast and loose with national security and now that it’s blown up in his face it’s denials all around. The problem is that anyone with a brain knows better. Given Obama’s cavalier approach to national security secrets now it’s frightening to think what he might do in a second term when he has more “flexibility.”
He just can’t shut up.
NOTE;
HERE IS MORE INSIGHT INTO OBAMA'S LEAKS - POSTED ON FLOPPING ACES:
Nan G says:1
On Stuxnet.
Israeli officials who were placed at risk by the Obama administration’s leaks about the Stuxnet virusare disputing American claims that the cyber-weapon was jointly developed by the U.S. and Israel. Rather, they say, Israeli intelligence first started developing cyberspace warfare against Iran, only convincing the U.S.–with some difficulty–to join in. 
See:
http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/2012/06/mossad-stuxnet-is-our-baby-obama.html
And also:
http://israelspy.com/the-spin-about-centrifuges-let-america-take-credit-for-delaying-irans-nuclear-ambitions/
So, not only was Obama willing to leak to build himself up at the expense of the LIVES of others, he is also willing to embellish what he leaks.
This fits perfectly with his warped personality that demands others be lowered so he looks better.