Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Is Boot why Petraeus got the boot?

Even in the post-election season, a blogger can't wander away from the internet for a couple of days, as I recently did. Time to catch up with the exploding tale of the David Petraeus resignation.

First and foremost: Of all the parapolitical interpretations I've seen, Robert Parry's still seems the most persuasive. Parry thinks that the Obama administration used this scandal -- which other presidents might have been swept under the proverbial rug -- as a means of ridding himself of a neo-con who worked in secret against Obama's interests.

We'll have more on that...

You probably know by now about the other other woman, Jill Kelly. The Paula-Jill catfight has the advantage of instantly deep-sixing all "honeytrap" speculation. Of course, even honeytrappers can fall in love. Besides, the "catfight" was rather civilized and may not have the significance most presume.

This bit is of interest:
A senior law enforcement official in Washington said on Tuesday that F.B.I. investigators looking into Ms. Kelley’s complaint about anonymous e-mails she had received examined all of her e-mails as a routine step.

“When you get involved in a cybercase like this, you have to look at everything,” the official said, suggesting that Ms. Kelley may not have considered that possibility when she filed the complaint. “The real question is why someone decided to open this can of worms.”

The official would not describe the content of the e-mails between General Allen and Ms. Kelley or say specifically why F.B.I. officials decided to pass them on to the Defense Department. “Generally, the nature of the e-mails warranted providing them to D.O.D.,” he said.

Under military law, adultery can be a crime.
I presume that when Petraeus retired, military law stopped applying. And does the FBI often investigate adultery in the military? Isn't that an internal DOD matter?

I agree: The real question is why someone decided to open this can of worms.

Early on, we heard that the FBI was concerned about a possible leak of classified information. In that light, the following (from this CNN story) seems of interest...
Also, a video has surfaced of a speech by Broadwell in which she suggested the Libya attack on September 11 was targeting a secret prison at the Benghazi consulate annex, raising unverified concerns about possible security leaks.

"I don't know if a lot of you have heard this, but the CIA annex had actually taken a couple of Libyan militia members prisoner and they think that the attack on the consulate was an effort to get these prisoners back," said Broadwell in a speech last month at the University of Denver.

A senior intelligence official told CNN on Monday, "These detention claims are categorically not true. Nobody was ever held at the annex before, during, or after the attacks."

Broadwell's source for that previously unpublished bit of information remains unclear, and there's no evidence so far that it came from Petraeus.
Obviously, someone told that woman something.

Let's take a few steps back. Why has the right remained so fixated on Benghazi, even though the average citizen wisely refused to go mad over the issue? I've long thought that a clue can be found in this Craig Unger piece. Unger intimates that leaders of the Republican party had received information from an intelligence source about Benghazi, and that this information was somewhat at odds with the story being told by the Obama administration. Unger does not divulge (and may not know) the name of this source, but it is fair to presume that he or she either serves in the spook community or has a relationship with someone who does.

Question 1: Did the same source speak to Broadwell?

Question 2: Was Petraeus the source? Was he chatting up not just Paula Broadwell, but also Karl Rove and crew?

Question 3: If Petraeus was not a direct source for the Republicans, could he have been an indirect source?

Odd thought: Perhaps Paula Broadwell was the one who went running to the GOP head honchos. That's quite possible. Right now, however, my main suspicion runs in another direction.

Petraeus is best buds with neocon writer Max Boot. During the campaign, Boot functioned as a Romney adviser. Remember all those stories about how Romney had surrounded himself with Dubya's merry band of war-lovers? Boot was a key part of that crew.

The Boot connection strengthens both Craig Unger's story and Bob Parry's. It seems quite possible that Boot was the source who told the Rove/Romney crew to keep pushing the betrayed-in-Benghazi meme. Moreover, it seems quite possible that Boot got his information from David Petraeus.

Put yourself in Obama's shoes. If your CIA Director is good friends with the key foreign policy adviser to the guy running against you -- well, yeah, that's something to worry about.

This segment from the Boot bio on Right Web is worth noting:
Boot has also criticized the Obama administration’s handling of foreign affairs, implying that it has not done enough to bolster “liberal” forces in regions impacted by the “Arab Spring.” After the September 2012 attacks on U.S. embassies spurred by the anti-Islam film Innocence of Muslims, Boot wrote that the “attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Cairo … make clear that the provision of further IMF loans and loan forgiveness by the U.S. must be made conditional on Mohamed Morsi’s government doing more to control Islamist militants. In the longer term, such attacks show the need for the U.S. to do more to aid secular liberal groups in their struggle for power so that the Muslim Brotherhood does not develop a hammerhold on Egypt’s government, which it can then use to whip up hysteria over alleged wrongs done to Islam. Beyond that, the U.S. government must do everything possible–including the unleashing if necessary of Special Operations Forces and covert CIA operatives–to hunt down the perpetrators of the Libyan attack.”[3]

Along with like-minded writers like Charles Krauthammer, Boot holds privileged perches in the U.S. news media and foreign policy communities. He is a columnist for the Los Angeles Times and his writings often appear in other major U.S. media outlets. Boot also writes frequently for William Kristol’s Weekly Standard and has participated in neoconservative advocacy initiatives like the Project for the New American Century.

Boot has been a leading agitator for a U.S. attack on Iran, writing op-eds and appearing in public forums to argue that “the only credible option for significantly delaying the Iranian nuclear program would be a bombing campaign,” as he put in a 2011 opinion piece for the Los Angeles Times.[4] In a January 2012 blog post for the neoconservative Commentary magazine, Boot cited a heavily criticized Foreign Affairs article by Matthew Kroenig championing a bombing campaign against Iran, to argue: “If the U.S. is truly determined to prevent [a nuclear Iran]—and if we’re not, we should be—the most effective option is to use force. Obviously, air strikes carry risks of their own, but those risks have to be measured against the risk of letting Iran go nuclear.”
Although my attitude toward Obama remains cynical, I don't think he wants war with Iran. The Democratic party won't tolerate an attack. Obama knows that military action will serve only to make him the most hated president in history.

Yet make no mistake about it: War with Iran is the ultimate goal of the neocons. Everything they do and say must be seen in that light. Moreover, they probably would prefer to push a Democrat into launching such a foolish and ruinous endeavor. Better to damage Team Blue than Team Red.

I doubt that the neocons really care about their ginned-up Benghazi charges. Libya is simply a cudgel for the right-wingers to use against the administration. That said, I would not be terribly surprised to learn there really is an as-yet-untold factor -- a secret something -- lurking behind the Benghazi story. Paula Broadwell may have offered a pointer in the right direction.

14 comments:

Bob Harrison said...

I can feel understanding creeping around the edges of this tale now.

Anonymous said...

This is a true hornet's nest. I think I heard POTUS will be having a press conference tomorrow. That should be interesting! If the neocons and other war mongers end up twisting in the wind on this mess, it won't hurt my feelings one bit!

Peggysue

Anonymous said...

If Obama is really behind it, it's hard to see how it's not going to blow back on him, given the mushrooming nature of the scandal, and the fact that the wingers already suspect him of covering up...something or other...in Benghazi.

cracker said...

It's hard to know where to start. Here's a partial list of important players in the military-industrial complex who have gone down in the last 30 days:
Petraeus-CIA head, former 4 star- sexicide.
Rear Admiral Gaouette, commander of an aircraft carrier task force in Persian Gulf-drunk in public.
Army general Carter Ham, commander of Africom-relieved after not following order to "stand down" regarding Benghazi.
General John Allen, commander of all US and NATO forces in Afghanistan-caught up in Petraeus' scandal, may or may not survive.
Christopher Kubasik, CEO of Lockheed-sexicide.
Now we're told Obama will name John Kerry to Sec Defense, which means Panetta is out with no new job mentioned for him. And just to close the loop, the unnamed FBI agent originally assigned to the Petraeus scandal is in trouble for allegedly sending inappropriate e-
mails to the other other woman, Jill wotsername in Tampa.
My personal theory (at the moment) is that a "soft coup" was planned to knock Obama out of the White House with an October surprise and replace him with Romney for purposes unknown, but I can guess a few. Whatever happened at Benghazi was part of it, although not everyone on this list might have been.

Anonymous said...


I have read on a military blog that retirement doesnt affect the applicability of military law.

The penalty for adultery even in retirement is being stripped of rank and I think potentially 1y in the a military prison. I doubt it will come to that.

Harry

Anonymous said...

Again, I tend to lean towards cracker's theory. Something about this whole thing stinks and the sudden revelations/dismissals of various actors appears to be more than a coinky-dink. In an earlier post Joe suggested the anti-Muslim film itself was pretty squirrely, the people involved, the timing, etc., etc. It does make one wonder if Benghazi [which went terribly wrong with 4 Americans killed] wasn't meant as a political takedown, the September/October surprise to cripple the Obama Administration and cement a Romney win. Fox News has been obsessed with the story and eager to blame POTUS, Clinton, whatever high-level Dem they can readily smear.

Or maybe I just have my tinfoil hat on crooked :0).

Peggysue

Michael said...

I think it was a CIA "soft coup" to overthrow Petraeus. Someone at CIA has their fingerprints on this. Maybe they did it out of spite and hatred. Maybe they did it because Petraeus has been fucking up CIA business all along (Benghazi the latest) and the careerists are sick and tired of taking the blame. To have this blow up days before Petraeus was to give his report to Congress is pretty suspicious. And, I thought FBI wasn't allowed to investigate anything that came near CIA business without CIA's invitation.

Michael said...

I really doubt the White House engineered this. They took advantage of it, sure, but this thing looks like a prototypical CIA black op - sick, twisted, crazy - and none of their fingerprints on it.

Anonymous said...

And I still hold my position that the Obama camp knew more about the GOPs relationship with the video drama and what happened with intel on this with the attack.
They probably showed them the cards they held and the October Surprise was "killed".... this scandal was then delayed until after the election.
kc

Anonymous said...

It should also be noted that the whole issue of Libyan militia being detained was first aired on Fox (aired the same day as the speech)-they claimed to have "inside sources:"......and this is being debated as the originating source for the Broadwell's intel leakage.
I wouldnt be surprised if Broadwell actually was the source- she does appear to have a big mouth, with a whole lot of narcissistic tendencies. She would love to affect an election with that sort of intel leak, knowing that they were going to report it- her speech was covered.
It would be timed after Patraeus did his special trip to Benghazi to fact find, so to speak. In any case, there is much more to this story and I really believe they thought that somehow people would react with the fervor they had with 911 - galvanizing people at the polls.

As for Kelley-well that just stinks to high heaven....Lebanese nonprofit ripoff, with twin sister committing bankruptcy fraud. Meanwhile, Kelley claimed she had diplomatic protection when asking for police protection against the reporters banging on their door. Spooky.
kc

Anonymous said...

The golden turd that everyone is side stepping is "Prostitution Ring." The second golden nugget that must not be discussed: "Honeypot". But who's Honeypot? Israel's? U.S. Defense? South Korea? Lebanon?

But whatever, let's just keep feeding the dummies more red herring that this is all just FUN N GAMES among spies N generals that just happened to be followed by an Israeli escalation in the Middle East. A huh a huh

Anonymous said...

Cracker, it seems the whole goal here was to give Obama his own 9/11, make him look like he allowed it or caused it and then sway the vote towards Romney who would then get into office and press for war with Iran and Syria. See Broadwell's bio.. she was involved with Syria and Iran discussions and had travelled to Jordan and Israel. Then afterwards she seduces the CIA chief. Doesn't mean she is Israel's gal though, but if not.. it kind of looks that way and maybe that is intentional. Either way, it is a setup of some type that ended with the seduction of the DCIA and classified docs on her computer.

Netanyahu was all over Romney right before the election. Big time manly love fest. It seems like they were expecting to win and something didn't pull through.

Now, Netanyahu not getting what he wanted goes off and pokes the hornets nest again to stir up trouble for Obama. Whatever the truth of the matter is, and whoever is behind it, Benghazi and Broadwell were most likely IMHO meant to push the U.S. back into war again.

Anonymous said...

Off the books Iran/Contra ratfuck spooks behind Benghazi?
http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2012/11/15/why-paula-broadwell-sent-those-emails/
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/23/world/23clarridge.html

Anonymous said...

The backstory on Benghazi.. Israeli agitation against Obama during the U.S. elections:

In 2008 Israel agitated against Obama by going into Gaza.

Go here and look at this list:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palestinian_rocket_attacks_on_Israel,_2008

There was NOTHING going on until November 4th, 4 days before the U.S. election when Israel decides to agitate on Nov. 4th and cross into Gaza to close a tunnel. Israel kills 6 Hamas and Hamas in return attacks Israel with rockets.

So Israel provoked Hamas in the lead up to the U.S. presidential elections in 2008. In October 2008 there was 1 rocket fired according to Wiki. After Israel's raid in November there are 125 rockets fired. Now in 2012 during ANOTHER presidential election, Israel does THE EXACT SAME THING. Agitating the new president to get involved with another stupid and costly war that Americans will have to pay for.

Back to Romney's Pal Netanyahu...
"Report: Netanyahu says 9/11 terror attacks good for Israel "
"We are benefiting from one thing, and that is the attack on the Twin Towers and Pentagon, and the American struggle in Iraq," Ma'ariv quoted the former prime minister as saying. He reportedly added that these events "swung American public opinion in our favor."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/975574.html

Chris