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Mark Greenberg
Life-long Progressive Who Got Woke

Hate Trump, but Obama’s twisted morality resonates

THE TALE OF BOWE BERGDAHL

June 27, 2009

Bowe Bergdahl writes a letter to his parents from Afghanistan:

I am ashamed to be an American. And the title of US soldier is just the lie of fools….The US army is the biggest joke the world has to laugh at….The horror that is America is disgusting.”

June 30, 2009

Bowe Bergdahl walks away from his battalion in Paktika Province in Afghanistan and claims he was captured when he fell behind while on patrol. Members of Bergdahl’s battalion claim that six soldiers were killed when ordered to search and rescue Bergdahl.

May 31, 2014

Bergdahl is released by his Taliban captors in exchange for five prisoners being held at Guantanamo Bay. Among the five were the Taliban army chief of staff, the deputy chief of intelligence, a former interior minister, and two other senior figures.

May 31, 2014

Barack Obama hosts Bob and Jani Bergdahl in a ceremony at The White House Rose Garden to extol the release of their son. Obama says: “And he wasn’t forgotten by his country because the United States of America does not ever leave our men and women in uniform behind.”

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel says Bergdahl was a “prisoner of war” and “We didn’t negotiate with terrorists.”

The Taliban was not listed on the State Department’s “official” list of terrorist organizations, so Mr. Hagel could somehow rationalize this bizarre statement.

National Security Adviser Susan Rice appears on ABC News and says that Bergdahl “served the United States with honor and distinction.”

November 3, 2017

Bowe Bergdahl’s court-martial, which began in September 2015, was finally adjudicated. He received a dishonorable discharge, a reduction in rank, fined $1000 in pay for 10 months, and received no prison time. There is much consternation, particularly among members of his battalion, with the military judge’s decision.

THE TERRORIST WITH CIVIL RIGHTS

Cut to Courtroom in New York City, November 28, 2017

Ahmed Abu Khattala was charged in a civilian court on 18 counts associated with the infamous terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012, in which four Americans were killed including Ambassador Chris Stevens.

Khattala, who was accused of orchestrating the attack, was found guilty of four of the 18 counts, but was found not guilty of the murder of the four Americans. There is much consternation, particularly among those who favored Khattala’s detainment in Cuba, with the court’s determination.

Because Obama and his Justice Department elected to bring Khattala to Manhattan and try him through Federal court, he was accorded the same rights as those which might be conferred upon an American citizen.

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas said at the time of his capture in June 2014:

Khattala is a foreign terrorist, captured by our Special Forces overseas for his violent attack on a U.S. facility. He belongs in Guantanamo and in the military justice system, not in the U.S. civilian court system with the constitutional protections afforded U.S. citizens.”

Remember that the FBI was prevented from getting into Libya and conducting a forensic investigation of the Benghazi site for 18 days.

Remember that Obama, Clinton and Susan Rice repeatedly blamed the attack of that night on an obscure videographer. He was arrested three days after the attack, taken before a civilian judge, denied bail and held because he “could not be trusted”. It took almost two years to apprehend Khattala and today – November 30, 2017 – former Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who chaired the House Oversight Committee, said that it was widely known that Khattala was not the “orchestrator” of the attack, but a mid-level figure. The orchestrator is well known to the Intelligence Community and remains at large.

Remember that Obama, Clinton, the Defense Department and the CIA, despite having retrieved Bowe Bergdahl who walked off his post and releasing five men in the business of killing Americans, did not make even a cosmetic attempt to retrieve the men and women who were in that compound or the CIA Annex in Benghazi the night of September 11, 2012.

“…the United States of America does not ever leave our men and women in uniform behind.”

And they even refused to bring the single individual they managed to capture for the heinous murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens and his compatriots to Guantanamo Bay, bringing him instead to Manhattan where he enjoyed the civil rights that were stolen from Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods.

Progressive protestations notwithstanding, there will continue to be a powerful push to bring the actions of those who held power during the eight years of the Obama Administration under greater scrutiny because there is a need to light up the extralegal activities that were countenanced by those iconic “Hope” posters and that beautiful, blazing smile.

About the Author
Professionally, Mark Greenberg comes out of the world of New York Media. He was a member of the management team that started MTV. He turned down a job at ESPN to move to Austin to raise his family of four boys in a more rational atmosphere. He was also a member of the bicoastal media elite that he critiques on a regular basis.
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