07/13/16

CCB Press Conference on Benghazi Proves Dereliction of Duty [Video]

By: Roger Aronoff | Accuracy in Media

The Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi (CCB) recently held a press conference and issued a report uncovering new details about the events leading up to and during the September 11, 2012 attacks in Libya that took the lives of four Americans. However, the press has done what it usually does when a story threatens the narrative or reputation of the administration of President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton—they have, for the most part, ignored or misrepresented the CCB’s findings.

The speakers at our June 29 event at the National Press Club in Washington exposed, once again, how the U.S. facilitated the provision of arms to al-Qaeda-linked rebels, and demonstrated that there were many warnings leading up to the attack on the Special Mission Compound, warnings that the administration ignored. In addition, the administration was derelict in its duty to send forces to aid those under attack in Benghazi.

I said that “There’s a media theme, or meme, out there that keeps saying—and you see this [at the] New York Times, CNN, everywhere, saying, ‘No new evidence of any wrongdoing by Hillary Clinton.’ That seems to be the conclusion of most of the media in response to yesterday’s [House Select Committee report]. And we see a field of smoking guns.”

“No matter what comes out…the role of many in the mainstream media is to protect the legacy of President Obama and protect the presidential candidacy and viability of Hillary Clinton,” I argued.

I was joined by a number of other members of the CCB, including former CIA officer Clare Lopez, General Thomas McInerney, Lt. Colonel Denny Haney, Admiral James “Ace” Lyons (all retired), our attorney John Clarke, as well as guests Rear Admiral Chuck Kubic (ret.) and Charles Woods, father of Ty Woods, the former Navy SEAL who was killed in the attack on the CIA Annex.

Here are some of our findings, in the words of each of the CCB members and the guests. In my earlier column on the press conference, we included a video of the entire event, including Q&A and crosstalk among the panelists. Here we present a video of each individual speaker. If you want to see the Q&A as well, please go to the previous column:

Clare Lopez:

“So, when we undertook to begin this second report, we think that we bring to this topic a willingness to name names, a willingness to assign responsibility and to demand accountability that too many of the others, committees and others, have not done—have neglected to do.”

“Now, from Christopher Stevens to the folks at the CIA Annex, they were in fact then relying on exactly the jihadist enemy that was eventually to turn on them and to kill four Americans and injure others so gravely.”

“Absolutely, they [Hillary and Obama] lied. There’s no question. We know, again, from Judicial Watch documents obtained through the FOIA process that the administration, including the President and Secretary of State Clinton, were actively involved that very night while the attack was still going on in concocting a false narrative to deflect the story from the truth and to defend at all costs, even the cost of American lives, the re-election campaign of the President. They were not even decided on which video they were going to blame. They only knew that they were going to blame a video.”

General Thomas McInerney (ret.):

“We should have prepositioned F-16s from Aviano down to Sigonella to be on 15-minute alert.”

“It was 9/11. Isn’t 9/11 a significant date for us? And yet we had none of this preparation. We had all of the Combatant Commanders back in Washington, DC, on a commanders’ conference.”

“So, there was no pre-planning. I call that dereliction of duty.”

Lt. Colonel Dennis Haney (ret.):

“I talked to Sean Smith’s uncle this morning, and he said he’s read our report. He got halfway through [Trey] Gowdy’s report, he got all the way through our report. He says read this [CCB] report if you want to know the truth.”

“Qaddafi was out there killing bad guys. He was killing al Qaeda, and al Qaeda we supported—they went to Syria, they became ISIS. We developed ISIS. That’s a fact.”

Admiral James “Ace” Lyons (ret.):

“And when I watched the [Select Committee on Benghazi’s] press conference yesterday, to say I was disappointed would be an understatement, because Chairman Gowdy is not a stenographer and he’s not a tape recorder. He was there to make findings and conclusions. He had the information; he copped out.”

“There’s no reason why F-16 aircraft weren’t moved from Aviano to Sigonella, or to Souda Bay, Crete—either place. We had a 130-man Marine force recon team at Sigonella. We had the Marine FAST teams at Rota. We had the Commanders’ in Extremis Force in Croatia. We had assets.”

“We know Jeremy Bash, the chief of staff at the Department of Defense, at 1910 that evening sent an email, or called the State Department, and said ‘we’re spinning up as we [speak].’ Where do we get the cross border authority?”

John Clarke:

“Now we just heard, I just found out, because I haven’t read Mr. Gowdy’s report, that the order [to deploy] was given at 7:00 pm. Well, the attack began at 3:42 pm. local time. That’s three hours later.”

Rear Admiral Chuck Kubic (ret.):

“And I found out eventually that it was Secretary Clinton working directly with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who had shut down not that truce talk [with Qaddafi] but had struck down a parallel one I didn’t even know was happening through a different business channel.”

“So it struck me that the same behavior that shut down the 72-hour truce at the onset of the war, leading to death, destruction a failed state, was the same kind of behavior that existed in that 7:30 [Deputies] meeting.”

Charles Woods:

“Many, many times Ty as a Navy SEAL in his 20 years of service was in worse situations than this. But he always knew that if there was a compromise of the mission, that he was going to be extracted. That did not happen in this case. That’s part of the DNA of being in the military. That’s part of the code of ethics, is you are always rescued.”

“We have a lot of experts in the military that say they could have been rescued. No attempt was made.”

You can read the CCB’s new report here. It is well documented, it puts Benghazi in context, it explains why we were in Libya, what we did and didn’t do, and it names the people most responsible for the failures of Benghazi.

Roger Aronoff

Roger Aronoff is the Editor of Accuracy in Media, and a member of the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi. He can be contacted at [email protected]. View the complete archives from Roger Aronoff.

07/8/16

AIM Editor on Conservative Commandos Radio Show about Benghazi

Accuracy in Media

AIM Editor Roger Aronoff appeared last week on the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Conservative Commandos Radio Show to talk about his recent article, “Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi Releases New Report; Press Conference on Wednesday.”

The Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi held a press conference on June 29 discussing the Obama administration’s dereliction of duty during the September 11, 2012 attacks. The report we issued is “an easy read, certainly compared to the 800-plus page Gowdy report,” noted Aronoff on the radio show.

“Well, look, Gowdy [and the Select Committee on Benghazi], they interviewed a hundred people under oath, and they had access to a lot more things than we did,” continued Aronoff. “But, they just kind of put it out there and said, ‘Look, read it. It’s 800 pages, come to your own conclusions.’ They failed to hold people accountable.”

President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should be held accountable for blaming the attacks on a video with full knowledge that these were terror attacks.

“This was several days later, [when Clinton was] telling [the family members of the deceased] that ‘we’re going to get that guy that made that video,’ when [she] knew in fact that the video had nothing to do with this,” said Aronoff. “We know that she knew that because of her email to Chelsea that night, her emails and transcript of her calls to the Egyptian prime minister and the Libyan president saying this was al-Qaeda related.”

Clinton and Obama must also be held accountable for helping to arm the Libyan rebels in the first place. “So, what we did, we facilitated the delivery of weapons to these al Qaeda and al Qaeda-related groups in Libya,” said Aronoff on the show. “And Christopher Stevens, he was not ambassador at that time, but he was an envoy to these groups. He was there at the docks when these things were being unloaded.”

“And what we learned from the Gowdy report this time is that there was this Deputies meeting at 7:30 that night where the power was basically transferred from Panetta in the Defense Department to Hillary at the State Department and, thus, the call to let the planes go,” said Aronoff. “We learned that the [military] changed uniforms four times because they were so sensitive to how the Libyans would feel if we sent in people in military uniforms versus civilian clothes. I mean, it’s that crazy.”

Despite Clinton’s and Obama’s blatant dereliction of duty, the media continue to look the other way. “But NBC, CNN, they figure if they don’t come and listen it didn’t really happen,” said Aronoff. Instead, he said, “everyone [in the media] is looking for how they can just blow off the Gowdy story and the whole thing.”

You can listen to the complete interview here.

07/6/16

CCB Press Conference on Benghazi Largely Ignored by Mainstream Media

By: Roger Aronoff | Accuracy in Media

On June 29, the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi (CCB) held a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington to discuss the release of its new report on the events surrounding the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack on the Special Mission Compound and CIA Annex, resulting in the deaths of four Americans. As usual, the liberal media largely stayed away. Apparently, if The New York Times, CNN, the Associated Press and NBC don’t cover a story, no matter how important, it isn’t really news. So instead, the only representative from the mainstream media was The Washington Post’s designated hit man, Dana Milbank, who regularly trolls conservative gatherings to heap scorn, sarcasm and peddle misinformation to his waiting readers. That is the sad state of journalism in this country today.

Mr. Milbank’s penchant for playing fast and loose with the details has gotten him in trouble before, when he claimed that conservative speakers had “taunted” a young Muslim girl. These speakers had, in fact, thanked her for her presence. In the latest case, Milbank wrote an opinion piece, not a news story, with the online headline, “Benghazi Conspiracy Theorists Turn on Trey Gowdy.” The headline in the print edition of the paper was “Appeasing the far right? You’ll always end up wrong.”

During the course of Milbank’s article, he called the members of the CCB “a coalition of far-right foreign-policy types,” “conspiracy theorists,” and “agitators.” This is all part of the attempt to discredit the messenger, because Milbank can’t really dispute the message—although he has certainly tried. But at least he was there, and spelled the names correctly, though he was wrong about the number of members on the commission (it’s 14, plus two advisory, not 11). Apparently the Post’s Fact-Checker was busy on other stories that day. Maybe they should hire more.

Milbank found our report to be what he called “full of inventive accusations.”

“They found ‘troubling evidence that Obama and Clinton were deeply and knowingly involved in running guns to al-Qaeda in Libya,’” writes Milbank, “as well as ‘a clear case of official U.S. government submission to the Islamic Law on slander.’”

“They determined that the Obama administration ‘switched sides in what was then called the Global War on Terror’ and ‘benefited this country’s worst enemies,’” he continues. “They wrote that Clinton herself blocked U.S. military forces from attempting a rescue mission, and they attributed the decision to oust Libya’s Moammar Gaddafi in part to financial interests of the Clinton Foundation.”

When Milbank quotes from the CCB’s findings, the obvious inference is that he finds these points to be baseless—and believes they could only originate from the minds of right-wing conspiracy theorists. The findings in the CCB’s latest report are, indeed, very damning accusations. But we back them up in every case, and encourage people to read the report and judge for themselves. Our military and intelligence experts—former admirals, generals, colonels, congressmen and CIA officers—are people with vast service to this country and outstanding reputations.

In particular, we have repeatedly demonstrated that the Obama administration decided to send arms to the Libyan rebels, who themselves were affiliated with al Qaeda and other jihadists. This ultimately contributed to the death of our Ambassador at the hands of Islamic jihadists, and Libya’s transformation into a terror safe haven.

It is Milbank who is being played for the fool by not looking at the evidence.

Apparently he doesn’t believe that Hillary Clinton, or anyone else, for that matter, “blocked U.S. military forces from attempting a rescue mission.” Yet American military assets were not sent to aid those in Benghazi. The Americans in Benghazi were left to withstand multiple terror attacks on their own, lasting approximately 13 hours from start to finish .

That is why the testimony from Gen. Tom McInerney is so compelling. He led the air attacks into Libya in 1986. Admiral Ace Lyons, another member of the CCB, commanded more than 250,000 troops at one time as commander in chief of the Pacific Fleet of the U.S. Navy—while Dana Milbank was giving secret handshakes and who knows what else at Skull and Bones meetings at Yale.

If Milbank had wanted to actually read our report and challenge it on a factual basis, I could respect that. But all he wanted to do is make disrespectful, cutting comments that cast a slur on others while having no basis in fact. When it comes to knowing whether military assets could have been brought to Benghazi that night to attempt to save lives, whom are you going to trust—Milbank or McInerney? Does anyone really believe they couldn’t have gotten there if ordered to do so? And why, with multiple warnings of a terrorist attack in Benghazi in the weeks leading up to September 11, 2012, weren’t military assets on high alert, prepared for such an attack?

Jerome Corsi at WorldNetDaily did read the report, and he wrote a different sort of articleilluminating the dereliction of duty by the Obama administration.

“[Clare] Lopez charged Clinton’s role in the Benghazi debacle was ‘pivotal,’” writes Corsi. “She said that under Clinton’s leadership, the State Department ‘changed sides’ in the war on terrorism in Libya.”

Far from a baseless accusation, Clinton’s pivotal role can be seen in her aide, Jake Sullivan’s email that Clinton had “leadership/ownership/stewardship of this country’s Libya policy from start to finish.” Yet somehow we are supposed to believe that Mrs. Clinton ignored Libya after Qaddafi’s death, and missed 600 requests for additional security. That’s what she told the House Select Committee on Benghazi when she testified last October.

The military dereliction of duty in Benghazi is shocking, as well. “So we had no pre-planning of the possibility of a terrorist attack in the region on that day and while the attack was underway no U.S. military assets were moved into action,” said McInerney. “At least a fly-by over Benghazi could have been arranged, with F-16s using full after-burners that could have dispersed the terrorists and ended the attack.”

Corsi recounts how Charles Woods, the father of Ty Woods, spoke at the June 29 press conference, and asked to know who is “responsible” for his son’s death. Ty was a former Navy SEAL who was part of the CIA Annex Security Team. In fact, I hope every American will get the chance to watch the movie “13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi.” It is available on demand on most cable TV services. I attended the premiere last January in Dallas.

Jennifer Harper of The Washington Times also highlighted the new report from the CCB.

Regrettably, without even attending the event, MSNBC repeated some of the lies perpetuated by Milbank. “This is what it’s come to: Benghazi conspiracy theorists are so creative, and so unmoved by evidence or reason, that they can convince themselves that congressional Republicans are in on the conspiracy,” writes Steve Benen for MSNBC (emphasis in original).

As my colleagues and I explained at the press conference, Select Committee on Benghazi Chair Trey Gowdy (R-SC) had an unparalleled opportunity to explain the attacks, connect the dots and hold people accountable. Instead, he and the remainder of the GOP members largely acted as stenographers rather than investigators. Representatives Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Mike Pompeo (R-KS) provided a supplemental report more willing to place blame, and at the press conference on June 28 when their report was released, Pompeo called Mrs. Clinton’s actions “morally reprehensible.” But when it came to passing judgment, Gowdy took a pass.

This has allowed the mainstream media to claim that despite an exhaustive investigation, no new revelations have been found that implicate Hillary Clinton. For Benen, his headline reads that Clinton has been “exonerated.” But no new revelations were necessary to demonstrate the ongoing Benghazi cover-up.

You can read our new report or watch our entire June 29 press conference here:

12/5/15

Putin’s “War on Terror” Could Backfire

By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

There can be no doubt that the Russians are winning the Middle East propaganda war. But it’s not just the Marxist far-left that is willing to believe whatever Vladimir Putin and his mouthpiece Russia Today (RT) are saying. Some conservatives and self-described Tea Party leaders have also accepted the disinformation the Russians are putting out, even to the extent of affirming the Russian president as a Christian statesman leading the global war on terror.

Consider Chuck Baldwin’s piece, “Rootin’ for Putin,” which insists that “Russia’s Vladimir Putin is the only one fighting a Just War in the Middle East right now.” Baldwin, a Christian pastor “dedicated to preserving the historic principles upon which America was founded,” was the presidential candidate in 2008 of the Constitution Party, a group associated with the late conservative icon Howard Phillips.

It is simply amazing that any conservative would insist that Putin, who, despite dropping the communist label is still allied with Iran, Communist China, North Korea and Cuba, is somehow doing the right thing in Syria, a long-time Soviet/Russian client state. What Putin is doing is entirely consistent with what the Soviets always did. They are trying to save a client state from what started out as a popular rebellion.

In his column, Baldwin went on to label Barack Obama, David Cameron of Britain, Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, King Salman of Saudi Arabia, and Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey as “international gangsters.”

It is true that Obama, through a few of America’s Arab “allies,” has been supporting the cause of some jihadists and terrorists in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been implicated in these dangerous schemes, one of which culminated in the Benghazi massacre of four Americans in Libya. That was a treasonous action that should sink Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and could have justified impeachment charges against Obama himself. Mrs. Clinton was Obama’s Secretary of State at the time.

These operations in the Middle East have been characterized by former CIA officer Clare Lopez of the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi as “switching sides in the War on Terror.”

But the idea that Putin has clean hands in the Middle East is absolutely ridiculous. Considering that he was a Soviet KGB spy and actually headed one of the KGB’s successor agencies, the idea that Putin has suddenly had a Damascus Road conversion to Christianity is simply ludicrous. His foreign policy is very similar to that of the old Soviet Union.

Since the foreign policy has mostly remained the same, Soviet financing and sponsorship of international terrorist networks, many of them linked to Arab and Muslim groups, also have to be taken into consideration here. It is reasonable to assume that the Russians have maintained at least parts of these networks for a purpose that we see in the backing of Bashar Assad in Syria. Indeed, writer and researcher Christian Gomez has traced the roots of ISIS to the Islamic Revival Party, created by the KGB, during the final days of the old Soviet Union. U.S. Army Colonel Steve Warren, a spokesman for Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve, has noted that the Russians are doing little in Syria to fight ISIS terrorists and that “Everything they [the Russians] are doing is to support Assad, to keep Assad in power.” In other words, Putin is continuing a clever Soviet-style strategy that seeks to maintain Assad in power while using ISIS for his own purposes. One of those purposes, as reflected in RT propaganda, is to make Putin look like a terrorist fighter.

Baldwin isn’t the only personality on the right duped by Putin and his propaganda machine. The CEO of a group calling itself simply the Tea Party has distributed an article claiming that Russia has produced “stunning photographic evidence” that ISIS oil was being smuggled into Turkey on an industrial scale.

The “stunning photographic evidence” shows nothing of the sort. Natasha Bertrand of Business Insider examined the Russian maps and found that the three main routes the Russians claim ISIS had allegedly been using to transport illicit oil into Turkey are not primarily controlled by the Islamic State. Turkish President Erdogan has countered: “Who is buying oil (from ISIS)? Let me say it. George Haswani, holder of a Russian passport and a Syrian national, is one of the biggest merchants in this business.” He noted that the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Haswani, who was also placed on an EU sanctions list, “for serving as middleman for oil purchases by the Syrian regime from the ISIS group.”

If you haven’t heard about the sanctions on the individuals and networks providing support to Syria and facilitating Syrian oil purchases from ISIS, you are a victim of the slick propaganda that is being spread around the world by such outlets as RT. It is a fact that the Russian claims against Turkey are taking precedence, even in the Western media, over the facts on the ground, as determined not only by the U.S. Treasury but the U.S. Army. Colonel Warren said, “We flatly reject any notion that the Turks are somehow working with ISIL,” he said. “That is preposterous.”

The “Tea Party” article about the Russian claims was lifted directly from the Infowars.com site of Russian apologist Alex Jones, who just scored a major interview with GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump. No respectable Tea Party group should have anything to do with Alex Jones, who defended the Russian invasion of its former republic Georgia in 2008. Trump’s decision toappear on his show was extremely foolish. He apparently was not aware that Jones promotes claims that actual terrorist attacks, such as the Boston Marathon bombings carried out by two Muslims from Russia, were “false flags” perpetrated by U.S. police and law enforcement agencies. His website ran a “Voice of Russia”story claiming the dead and wounded were actors plastered with fake blood.

Rather than treat Putin as a good guy or ally, GOP presidential candidate Senator Marco Rubio (FL) argues that Turkey is a member of NATO and an ally that “deserves the full backing of the United States.” He noted that the Russians were “targeting Turkmen-populated pockets of northern Syria rather than territory controlled by ISIS” and that “Most Russian military strikes since the end of September have been non-ISIS targets, including many civilian areas, revealing that Russia does not share our interest in confronting and defeating ISIS but instead is intent on propping up the Assad regime.”

Before he assumed the role as a leader of the Sunnis in the Middle East, mobilizing forces against Shite Iran and Syria, Erdogan was known for his anti-Soviet views. Indeed, he was an anti-communist in his youth. As a result of Russia’s increased military involvement in Syria, he seems to have awakened to the fact that Putin has returned to his Soviet roots and that Turkey’s future lies with NATO and the West. Turkey joined NATO, originally conceived as an anti-Soviet military alliance, in 1952.

Assuming Erdogan is an Islamist of some kind, as some conservatives contend, it might make strategic sense for the West to back him for that reason alone in his battle with Russia. After all, most of Russia’s 14 million Muslims are Sunnis. RT itself recently highlighted how thousands of Muslims had gathered in central Moscow “to witness the opening of one of the biggest mosques in Europe.” The ceremony was attended by Putin and Erdogan, who had been considered to be on friendly terms.

Their relationship turned sour after Turkey shot down the Russian war plane, and it seems to be deteriorating further.

As noted by Ilya Arkhipov of Bloomberg Business, Putin used his annual state-of-the-nation address to attack Turkey and Erdogan in very personal and religious terms. Putin said, “Only Allah knows why they did this. And it seems that Allah decided to punish the ruling gang in Turkey by stripping it of common sense and reason.” Analyst Timothy Ash told Bloomberg that “The religious angle being used by Putin is unlikely to go down well in the region, where Erdogan is still seen as a defender of the Sunni faith.”

One observer has noted, in regard to Russian involvement in Arab/Muslim terrorism and now ISIS, that the monster that the USSR created may have grown too big, and that it may eventually attack its creator. In the case of Turkey, Putin is facing a Muslim problem of his own making.

09/2/15

Media Nervous Over Hillary Sting Videos

By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

You know an event is potentially damaging to Hillary Clinton or other top Democrats when Dana Milbank of The Washington Post shows up. Hence, Milbank’s attendance at Tuesday’s James O’Keefe news conference on Clinton campaign violations of federal election law was an indication that the Democrats are concerned. This time, despite video evidence of top staffers for Hillary accepting cash from a known foreign national, most of the media reaction was vintage Milbank. “Is this a joke?” the media wanted to know.

In fairness, Milbank’s questions seemed mild, when compared to some of the other media reactions.

The joke question came from Olivia Nuzzi of The Daily Beast, with other liberals joining in and wondering what the press conference was all about. The law says that foreigners are strictly prohibited from contributing to U.S. political campaigns, and O’Keefe had dramatic evidence of the campaign law violation. Thevideo was played on a television screen for all to see.

Looking for some reason not to pay attention to the facts, some in the media seized upon the small amount of money that was used to pay for the Hillary campaign merchandise in question.

This was not the only media reaction, but it seemed to be one of the most popular. “James O’Keefe Targets Clinton Campaign For Legally Selling A T-Shirt,” was the dishonest headline over an article attacking O’Keefe published by Media Matters, the pro-Hillary and George Soros-funded group. This article set the tone for the pro-Hillary contingent in the press.

However, the great number of journalists who showed up was an indication that, when it comes to Hillary, nobody really knows how serious the law-breaking will get. O’Keefe suggested that more evidence against the campaign is yet to come.

Milbank may be in a quandary about what to do with Hillary, who is dropping in the polls against the socialist career politician Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and leaving the Democratic presidential field open to other candidates, most notably Vice President Joe Biden, a notorious plagiarist. (In Biden’s case, Media Matters had also defended him, insisting the plagiarism wasn’t as serious as some knew to be the case).

Milbank’s modus operandi in the past has been to ridicule conservatives who provide evidence of corruption by top Democrats such as Hillary and Barack Obama. For example, he attacked those who investigated Obama’s relationship with communist Frank Marshall Davis. He showed up at an AIM conference to write an article distorting the findings of the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi, which investigated Hillary’s role in covering up the terrorist attack that killed four Americans.

Mollie Hemingway of The Federalist has written that Milbank “serially exaggerates or distorts what he writes about. It’s just what he does.”

But those distortions won’t suffice when the video evidence itself can be seen by millions, telling the real story that some in the media try to conceal. As Project Veritas emphasized, the video shows Molly Barker, the Director of Marketing for Hillary Clinton’s national campaign, knowingly breaking campaign finance law by accepting a straw donation from a foreign national.

O’Keefe, who almost single-handedly took down the Alinskyite ACORN organization, has also investigated Planned Parenthood and National Public Radio. He wrote the book, Breakthrough: Our Guerilla War to Expose Fraud and Save Democracy, and has targeted Republican politicians in the past as well.

His reputation meant that O’Keefe’s Project Veritas Action news conference at the National Press Club was packed, with at least seven television cameras there to record the proceedings.

Washington Post reporter David Weigel conveyed the message from the Clinton campaign that the event was much ado about nothing. But at least he did an advance story about the video and got the Clinton campaign response.

Los Angeles Times reporter Evan Halper played the story to the advantage of the Hillary campaign, insisting that the video somehow missed its target. It was “Hardly the stuff of a Pulitzer Prize,” he insisted. He found it newsworthy, and somehow relevant to the issue of federal law violations, that the journalist from The Daily Beast had treated the video as a joke.

The “joke” response said more about the lack of seriousness from The Daily Beast than it did about O’Keefe’s video. Making matters worse, Olivia Nuzzi of The Daily Beast seemed proud of the fact that she didn’t grasp the seriousness of the election law violations, highlighting her “Is this a joke?” responses on her Twitter account.

O’Keefe may have the last laugh, as he repeatedly emphasized that more videos are coming, and that other Hillary officials may be in them and forced to resign. Reporters in attendance, anxious to dismiss these charges, seemed nervous about this prospect. They repeatedly pressed O’Keefe to spill more details about other undercover operatives he may have in the Clinton and other campaigns. He told the media they would just have to wait.

It was nervous laughter from the press, as they couldn’t figure out what other damaging evidence O’Keefe’s crew may have against the Democratic presidential candidate.

In a message to his supporters, O’Keefe noted, “Since at least 1996, Hillary and her husband Bill have been accused of accepting foreign contributions to further their political ambition. Back then, it was China accused of funneling massive amounts of money into the Clinton campaign and the DNC [Democratic National Committee]. The State Department investigated the matter. Three Americans were convicted of crimes, one of whom, Johnny Chung, admitted that $35,000 of his contributions came from the Chinese military. But Bill and Hillary got off clean.”

Not all media were prepared to laugh this all away. In his story about the O’Keefe news conference, Alan Rappeport of The New York Times seemed to admit that O’Keefe had struck gold, noting, “Foreign donations are a sensitive subject for the Clintons, as their family foundation has been under scrutiny for accepting money from overseas while Mrs. Clinton was secretary of state, and recent State Department emails showed that former President Bill Clinton tried to get permission to give paid speeches in North Korea and the Democratic Republic of Congo.”

One question is whether the illegal transactions captured in the Project Veritas video are part of a pattern of illegal conduct. The media will just have to wait. Maybe their laughter will die down in the wake of more videos being released.

Asked why the major media don’t do these kinds of undercover investigations and the job falls on him and his staff, O’Keefe dismissed the significance of liberal media bias and said that he thinks journalists are more motivated by a desire to protect their access to candidates like Hillary. In other words, reporters have to flatter the candidates with fawning coverage.

But it’s increasingly difficult to portray Hillary in a favorable light. At the campaign event where the video of the illegal contribution was recorded, Hillary had told the crowd that she would “stop the endless flow of secret, unaccountable money that is distorting our elections, corrupting our political process, and drowning out the voices of our people.”

A reporter seeking to maintain access to a candidate like this, caught in scandal after scandal, is something that is destined to truly become a joke.

09/2/15

Huffington Post Attack on Admiral Lyons is Based on Willful Ignorance

By: Roger Aronoff
Accuracy in Media

Too often members of the mainstream media are content to marginalize those with whom they disagree, and mock experts as dark conspiracy theorists rather than rebutting their points. When the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi (CCB) held its first conference exposing the Benghazi scandal, The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank followed this derogatory playbook to the letter.

Now, it seems, The Huffington Post’s Sam Stein is also content to emulate Milbank’s distortions, and to simply mock that which he knows little about. His August 18 column, “AIPAC Chose A Peculiar Admiral For Its Memo Against The Iran Deal,” calls esteemed CCB member Admiral James “Ace” Lyons a figure who “hasn’t operated at the heights of political power,” and casts it as “peculiar” that Admiral Lyons’ name would be listed among other national heavyweights.

Lyons is a retired four-star admiral who was Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, which at that time was the largest single military command in the world. “As the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations from 1983 to 1985, he was principal advisor on all Joint Chiefs of Staff matters.” He also served as the senior military representative to the United Nations, and is far from a babe in the woods when it comes to navigating the politics of power. Following the Marine Barracks bombing in Lebanon in 1983, the first military person that then-CIA Director William Casey sent for was Ace Lyons. Admiral Lyons was clearly a major player at the highest levels of government.

But facts don’t matter to Stein—he has a phony narrative to sell. “Instead, he [Admiral Lyons] has spent his time peddling dark conspiracy theories that probably explain why he doesn’t support the deal with Iran,” writes Stein.

“In particular, Lyons is of the firm belief that the Obama administration has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood,” he argues. “Elsewhere, he said the Muslim Brotherhood has ‘carte blanche entry into the White House’ and in effect has ‘become an effective cabinet member.’”

The Investigative Project on Terrorism has provided a detailed analysis of several members of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) who are official advisors to the White House or various agencies within the Executive branch. The question for Stein, and for the public in general, is whether or not we should care about the influence of the MB on this and other administrations.

Stein must not be aware that earlier this year President Barack Obama invited a number of radical Muslim leaders to the White House to discuss “‘anti-Muslim bigotry’ and banning Muslim terrorist profiling by federal law enforcement,”according to Investor’s Business Daily. The IBD editorial board wrote about several of those visitors:

“Imam Mohamed Magid, who preaches at a fundamentalist Northern Virginia mosque that has listed a number of trustees and major donors whose offices and homes were raided after 9/11 by federal agents on suspicion of funding terrorists.”
“Azhar Azeez, president of the Islamic Society of North America, a known radical Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas front group that remains on the Justice Department’s list of unindicted terrorist co-conspirators.”
“Hoda Hawa, national policy adviser of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, which was founded by known members of the Muslim Brotherhood, a worldwide jihadist movement.”

MPAC’s “leadership praised Hezbollah and Islamist leaders like [Hassan] al-Banna in the 1990s, opposed the designations of Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist groups in 2003, and promoted the [Muslim] Brotherhood as a moderate force and potential U.S. ally in 2010,” wrote Ryan Mauro for The Clarion Project in 2013.

“It remains unclear why President Obama remains a stalwart believer that the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates should be treated as legitimate political entities, when history reveals the organization as one with radical goals,” reportedBreitbart last February. “Both Former Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and ISIS ‘caliph’ Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi were members of the Brotherhood. Its current spiritual leader, Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, has a knack for bashing Jews and praising Nazis. The Muslim Brotherhood’s motto remains: ‘Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Qur’an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.’”

President Obama has been unduly influenced by this radical group during both terms in office. “And I remind you that as [President Obama] was giving that [2009 Cairo] speech, two very important things that people forget about it,” saidjournalist Ken Timmerman at our Benghazi conference last year. “First of all, he was in Cairo, Cairo University, and there was an important person who was not even invited—not just not there, but wasn’t even invited.”

That person was then-Egyptian President, Hosni Mubarak. “And sitting behind the President of the United States as he’s giving this speech, so they’re pictured in all of the news footage of it, are top members of the Muslim Brotherhood—at that point still an outlawed group, although tolerated by the Mubarak regime,” continued Timmerman.

As the CCB Interim Report exposed, “The U.S. facilitated the delivery of weapons and military support to al Qa’eda-linked rebels in Libya.”

“With allegiances like these, Lyons seems to think, it’s no wonder Obama struck such a bad deal [with Iran]—indeed, it’s a shock he pursued any concessions at all,” writes Stein.

As we have reported, it was President Obama—not Iran—who made concession after concession as part of the flawed Iran deal. This disastrous arrangement will guarantee that Iran acquires nuclear weapons.

It is Admiral Lyons’ historical memory that shines a light on the danger of President Obama’s decision to give in to this totalitarian regime’s demands.

Lyons explained at last year’s conference how the U.S. had plans to take out the Islamic Amal, the “forerunner to Hezbollah,” immediately after the 1983 Beirut Barracks bombing.

“We had the photographs. We were going to make it look like a plowed cornfield in Kansas. We had the planes loaded,” said Admiral Lyons, then Deputy Chief for Naval Operations.

“And, at the meeting they go around the table, they brief [Ronald] Reagan, and it gets to [Caspar] Weinberger and he says, ‘I think there are Lebanese army troops in those barracks,’” said Admiral Lyons. “And okay, lo and behold, come back, and no, there are no Lebanese army troops in those barracks. But this time, and I get this direct from Bud McFarlane, who is the National Security Advisor, Weinberger starts waving his arms and so forth: ‘We’re going to lose all our Arab friends if we go ahead with this strike.’”

“We never got the orders to strike,” said Admiral Lyons. “And of course, what was the message? The message became Osama bin Laden’s rallying cry: ‘The Americans can’t suffer casualties. They will cut and run.’”

President Obama recently excused the concession to let Iran enrich uranium during an August 9 appearance on Fareed Zakaria’s CNN show. “And we did not have the support of that position among our global allies who have been so critical in maintaining sanctions and applying the pressure that was necessary to get Iran to the table,” Obama said. Apparently that was the same reason for all of the other concessions as well. Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute notedthat “Obama and Kerry crossed off every one of their own red lines” in pursuit of this deal..

Like Weinberger, Obama is clearly more concerned about his international legitimacy, and legacy, than standing up to Iran. His continuing support for the Muslim Brotherhood agenda also undermines our national security.

This could serve as a “teachable moment.” Should the Muslim Brotherhood be viewed as some benign, moderate organization? Or instead as the organization that spawned Al Qaeda and other significant terrorist organizations?

Each and every candidate from both parties should be asked whether he or she believes the United States government should receive counsel from the Muslim Brotherhood or entertain their influence. And that is especially true for Hillary Clinton, whose top aide and confidant, the controversial Huma Abedin, has strong family ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

08/30/15

Admiral James Lyons on Iran Nuke Deal [Video]

Accuracy in Media

Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi member Admiral James “Ace” Lyons (Ret.) appeared on The Daily Ledger show on the One America News Network earlier this week to discuss the Iran nuclear deal and its potential disastrous consequences for the United States.

“This [Iran] deal goes back to when President Obama was candidate Obama, about the time June 4 of 2008, at which time he opened up a secret communication channel to the Ayatollah regime in Tehran,” said Admiral Lyons on The Daily Ledger. Obama’s message to the Ayatollahs was that Iran would get a better deal under his presidency than under then-President George W. Bush, he said.

Lyons argued on The Daily Ledger that this “borders on treason.”

“Let me tell you, this deal is a total sellout,” he said. “But of course for Secretary [John] Kerry… he has no problem with this since this is the second time he has sold out his country.”

The Iranian deal does not prevent a nuclear Iran. What President Obama’s deal has done is “start a nuclear arms race in the most unstable region in the world,” said Lyons.

The deal also opens America up to an electromagnetic pulse attack, a method the Iranian military has considered using to destroy the United States.

Admiral Lyons also condemned Obama for not undermining Iran’s conventional weapons capability as part of the deal. “Even Jimmy Carter recognized that our position in the Persian Gulf was a vital interest to the United States,” he said.

Admiral Lyons was one of the speakers at the powerful Stop Iran Rally in New York’s Times Square last month, which drew a crowd of 12,000 people. He delivered passionate remarks alongside other CCB Members who have voiced their opposition to the deal. You can view their comments here.

You can watch Admiral Lyons’ full segment on The Daily Ledger here:

08/25/15

Military experts: Iran already has nuclear weapons

By: JEROME R. CORSI
WND

NEW YORK – Amid debate over President Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran, two retired military officers contend their accumulation of evidence from open and intelligence sources shows Tehran already has a nuclear-weapons capability.

Retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely and U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Dennis B. Haney assert that since 1979, a cabal of nations has aided and abetted Iran in its efforts to develop a robust nuclear program under the guise of generating a nuclear-energy system.

And they believe the White House is fully aware.

In an interview, Vallely told WND that President Obama, Secretary of State John Kerry and chief White House adviser Valerie Jarrett “are treading on treason under the U.S. Constitution for aiding and abetting Iran, a known enemy of the United States, while throwing Israel, a longtime U.S. ally, to the wolves.”

They charge the cabal is mainly comprised of Russia, China and North Korea, which have worked behind the scenes in collaboration with Iran to put all the parts in place.

The assistance includes providing the material needed to make a bomb. Vallely and Haney believe Iran can make a bomb now, and a “breakout” nuclear test detonation is imminent.

‘Treading on treason’

Vallely told WND that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “knows that Israel has little option but to launch a pre-emptive military strike on Iran, and I suspect Saudi Arabia will assist Israel militarily when the attack occurs.”

“Signing a nuclear agreement legitimizes Iran’s nuclear weapons future, while removing sanctions that gives Iran access to billions of dollars that can be diverted to advancing Iran’s terrorist goals against the United States and Israel,” Vallely said.

Haney agreed.

“President Obama has given the green light to the potential destruction of Israel by signing this agreement while Iran swears ‘death to Israel,’” Haney told WND.

“President Obama knows Iran has the bomb, and he knows Iran plans a nuclear attack on Israel. Obama has never liked Israel; he does not see Israel in the future of the Middle East that he sees dominated by radical Islam.”

Haney said Obama “is simply covering his tracks with this nuclear agreement with Iran.”

“The point is that Obama already knows Iran has the bomb and the entire negotiation has been nothing more than a charade, a smoke screen to cover up that Iran already has the bomb,” he said.

“The White House and Secretary of State Kerry know that Iran already has nuclear weapons capability and, to protect Obama’s legacy, the White House does not want it known Iran was allowed to develop nuclear weapons on Obama’s watch,” he explained.

“This way, a pathway for Iran to get the bomb has been created and put in place, so when Iran finally announces it has a nuclear weapon, Obama can argue that Iran simply got the bomb quicker than anybody anticipated, but not in violation of the agreement.”

He declared: “Iran is a nuclear weapons power now!”

In a joint statement, Vallely and Haney say an accumulation of available evidence shows a coalition of Russia, China and North Korea have assisted Iran since 1979 in achieving a nuclear weapon, despite sanctions, under the guise of a domestic nuclear energy program.

Vallely explained to WND that he and Haney have taken a systematic approach to evaluating each component needed to deliver a nuclear weapon, from the development and testing of a ballistic missile system, to the design of a nuclear weapons warhead, to the development of the weapons-grade uranium needed to produce a bomb.

“To come to our conclusion that Iran is a nuclear weapons power right now, we supplemented publicly available research, plus information from intelligence sources, including Iranian resistance groups such as the National Council of Resistance of IRAN, NCRI,” Vallely explained. “With the assistance of Russia, China and North Korea, Iran has developed and tested every component needed to develop and deliver a nuclear weapon against Israel.”

WND reported in February that the NCRI, in a Washington, D.C., press conference, added to a series of disclosures it made regarding Iran’s secret nuclear weapons program more than a decade ago. NCRI has claimed Tehran is operating a secret uranium-enrichment site northeast of the capital city that was not disclosed during the recent negotiations to the United States or to the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA.

Vallely and Haney made clear in their statement their conclusion that Iran will soon detonate its first nuclear device.

“Iranian government observers, research scientists and senior military officials have been on-site in North Korea for all their tests of nuclear component systems,” they said. “In essence, Iran has had the benefit of North Korea doing their development and testing for them.”

They said Russia, China and North Korea “always had the latitude and time to develop and test warhead design, fissionable material and detonation testing.”

“Iran participated in most all of the scheduled testing onsite.”

Vallely and Haney said the “release of up to $150 billion in Iranian assets, as a part of the sanctions against Iran, guarantees Iran further funding their nuclear weapons program and their terrorist proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas and others to include Assad of Syria.”

‘Ties to Iran’

Vallely and Haney combine their analysis of Iran’s nuclear weapons capabilities with an argument that Obama, Kerry and Jarrett have close ties to Iran that influence their political judgment.

All three allowed the United States to sign a nuclear weapons agreement with Iran knowing Tehran could develop a nuclear weapon today and realizing that an atomic Iran would be an existential threat to Israel, the retired officers said.

“Barack Hussein Obama, raised and schooled in Islam, mentored by American Communist Party member Frank Marshall Davis, with his primary adviser being Iranian-born Valerie Jarrett, has crafted a plan that guarantees Iran will have a nuclear weapon,” they said.

“The copy of the agreement handed out in English for the American delegation did not replicate the copy handed out in Farsi for the Iranians. The American delegation did not bring this up,” Vallely and Haney said.

“The Iranian delegation read both the English and Farsi-worded agreements, and declared that while they agreed with the one in Farsi, the one in English was not the same and was in no way acceptable to them.

“Prime negotiator John Forbes Kerry, himself a communist sympathizer during the Vietnam War, came out this past May with the admission that he has a daughter who married an Iranian-American who has extensive family ties to Iran,” they noted.

In 2009, Kerry’s daughter, Vanessa Bradford Kerry, married a Los Angeles-based Iranian-American physician, Dr. Brian (Behrooz) ValaNahad, who was born in New York, educated at UCLA, attended medical school at Yale and completed his internship and neurosurgery residence at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

The Nemazee connection

WND has reported the ties between American–Iranian Hassan Nemazee and John Kerry and Hillary Clinton.

Nemazee, prominent in Democratic Party fundraising since Bill Clinton’s second term in the White House, is an American-Iranian now serving time in federal prison for criminal bank fraud. Nemazee’s family fortune in Iran traces back to the Iranian opium shipping trade with China that began in the mid-1800s.

Nemazee’s credentials in raising money for Democratic Party presidential hopefuls is impressive. In 2004, he served as Kerry’s presidential campaign fundraising chairman in New York, and in 2008, he served prominently as one of Hillary Clinton’s most successful national presidential campaign fundraising chairmen.

Coincidentally, Jarrett was born in Shiraz, Fars Province, Iran, in Nemazee Hospital, named after Hassan Nemazee’s father, who had the distinction of transitioning the Nemazee family opium trade with the Far East into the 20th century.

‘Let’s provide Iran nuclear fuel’

WND reported that during his first presidential debate with President George W. Bush in 2004, Kerry, then the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee, argued that the U.S. should provide nuclear fuel to Iran. Kerry said the U.S. should trust Tehran, as had President Clinton with North Korea, that the Iranians would not use the fuel to make a bomb.

In the early 1970s, Pyongyang had begun to acquire nuclear fuel and plutonium processing technology from the Soviet Union to expand North Korea’s IRT-2000 research reactor that was gradually diverted to nuclear weapons development.

Then, in October 1994, former President Jimmy Carter announced from Pyongyang that Kim Il-sung had accepted the broad deal later formalized as the “Agreed Framework.” Within less than a decade, North Korea withdrew from the Nonproliferation Treaty and prohibited IAEA inspectors to actively monitor Pyongyang for nuclear weapons activities.

Vallely and Haney, both members of the independent Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi, made clear they are speaking for themselves regarding Iran and not on behalf of the commission.

07/30/15

New Report Confirms Findings of Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi

By: Roger Aronoff
Accuracy in Media

Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi (CCB) member Clare Lopez believes that in 2011 Hillary Clinton’s State Department was orchestrating its own gun running operation to the Libyan rebels—and that arms dealer Marc Turi has been set up to take the fall for these “illicit arms deals.”

“The Justice Department has charged Turi with lying on an export-license application, alleging he hid his intent to ship weapons and ammunition to Libya in direct violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 170,” reports Jerome Corsi for WorldNetDaily.

“Marc Turi was set up and framed for something he didn’t do, while others, who actually did collaborate with Qatar and the UAE to deliver the weapons under U.S. and NATO protection and supervision, are not only not prosecuted like Marc Turi, they’re not even mentioned,” Lopez told Corsi.

“Lopez made it clear she was speaking for herself and not for the commission,” he reports.

Corsi has written several previous articles about the work of the CCB, which was established by Accuracy in Media back in 2013. “The commission has been working behind the scenes for the past two years to ensure Congress uncovers what really happened in the Sept. 11, 2012, attack in Benghazi that killed U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans,” writes Corsi.

“Lopez [said the] ‘key point is that Marc Turi, despite receiving written approval from the U.S. government to broker weapons to Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, never actually went through [with] any weapons purchases or shipments to Qatar, to the UAE or to Libya,” he writes.

Lopez referred to the Citizens’ Commission’s April 2014 interim report, which stated: “Even more disturbingly, the U.S. was fully aware of and facilitating the delivery of weapons to the al-Qa’eda-dominated rebel militias throughout the 2011 rebellion. The jihadist agenda of AQIM, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), and other Islamic terror groups represented among the rebel forces was well known to U.S. officials responsible for Libya policy.”

In fact, “The rebels made no secret of their al-Qa’eda affiliation, openly flying and speaking in front of the black flag of Islamic jihad…” states the report.

When Hillary Clinton’s Libya-related emails were released, they exposed how Mrs. Clinton was interested in arming the rebels before they were “formally recognized by the U.S. or United Nations,” according to Catherine Herridge and Pamela Browne.

Fox News previously reported that Turi had said the “weapons supplied to Libya were in the hands of the U.S. government and the State Department’s Bureau of Political and Military Affairs, headed by key Hillary Clinton aide Andrew Shapiro,” reports Corsi. “Shapiro was responsible to oversee the export control process at the State Department.”

Mrs. Clinton exchanged emails with the Director of Policy Planning for the Department of State, Anne-Marie Slaughter, in the spring of 2011. On March 30, 2011, Slaughter counseled Hillary Clinton that she was “VERY dubious about arming the Libyan rebels.” When Hillary Clinton asked why, Slaughter argued that “sending more arms into a society generally… will result in more violence—against each other” and “adding even more weapons does not make sense.”

Yet Mrs. Clinton emailed her aide, Jake Sullivan, on April 8, 2011, that “FYI. The idea of using private security experts to arm the opposition should be considered.”

Years after the intervention, Libya remains a broken state marred by ongoing violence.

It’s already been established that Mrs. Clinton failed to turn over all of her work related emails, allowed sensitive and classified material on her private email server, and lied about both. Yet we are asked to believe that the more than 30,000 emails that she had deleted and wiped from her server were all personal emails. It’s clear that even her allies in the media are getting nervous about where all of this is headed, since she is the presumed Democratic Party standard bearer. The question is, will she ever be held accountable, and judged by the same standards as others who have “mishandled” classified information? And what about her role in the Libyan and Benghazi scandals? It is looking more and more like the only accountability may come from the American voters.

07/25/15

Legacy National Security Advisory Group Launch – MG Vallely

The American Report

Original at Stand Up America.

Editor’s Note: Obama and his minions have tried their best, and largely succeeded, to purge the U.S. military of patriotic officers who love this country. As a result, under Obama, America’s best interests are always put last.

This group of retired and decorated officers and experts, led by MG Paul E. Vallely, offers all Presidential candidates advice on forging a national strategy that is in the best interests of America!

* * *

Last week, MG Vallely, along with several staff members of Stand Up America US visited Washington, D.C. to attend several events and to launch the Legacy Group, an SUA project.

The events included a full meeting with the entire Legacy Group, the Citizens Commission on Benghazi, an evening with friends hosted by MG Vallely, and a reception hosted by Congressman Ryan Zinke, R-MT. There were several other meetings and interviews.

The Legacy National Security Advisory Group (LNSAG) is set up to advise presidential and congressional members and candidates on national security and military strategy.

LNSAG was created by MG Paul E. Vallely, (US Army, retired) and is populated by former military command and flag staff, special operations leadership, seasoned intelligence community members, former law enforcement, cultural and diplomatic experts, and a network of HUMINT that spans the globe.

As a well-recognized leader with impeccable characteristics and talents, the best and the brightest have gravitated to his side and are unparalleled in their fields and endeavors.

To commemorate the trip, here are several photos capturing the events:

MG Vallely arriving at the Citizens Commission on Benghazi then off to be interviewed by Frank Gaffney, Founder and President of the Center for Security Policy. Also pictured are the General with his Senior Middle East Advisor, Mr. Nagi N. Najjar, and SUA Marketing Director, Kevin Moore at breakfast that morning.

The Legacy National Security Advisory Group meets on the 18th. From left to right seated are Admiral Ace Lyons, Jack Shaw, Roger Aronoff, Wayne Simmons and Nagi Najjar. Standing (L to R) are Kevin Moore, LtC Dennis Haney, Clare Lopez, MG Vallely, and LtG Tom McInerney.

MG Vallely hosted a reception and is pictured with Wayne Simmons (center), and LtG Tom McInerney (right)

A group picture at the reception includes from left to right, Clare Lopez (standing), and seated on the couch are Roger Aronoff of Accuracy in Media, and Ray Tanter of the Iran Policy Group.

Seated in the chair is Mary Clare Kendall. Standing in the middle are MG Vallely, Christine Wagner, LtC Tony Shaffer, a Senior Fellow with both the London Center for Policy Research and the Center for Advanced Defense Studies, Admiral Ace Lyons, Wayne Simmons, LtG Tom McInerney, Sara and Marty Carter, Tommy Sears, Managing Director of the Legacy Group, and Nagi N. Najjar.

MG Vallely speaks with Clare Lopez of the Center for Security Policy and the Citizens Commission on Benghazi.

MG Vallely shares a laugh with (L to R), Kevin Moore, Congressman Ryan Zinke, Admiral Ace Lyons. (Turned from the camera are Lola Zinke and Tom McInerney.)

Another moment of group conversation.

MG Vallely with Tony Shaffer

Reception hosted by Congressman Zinke seen on the left next to his wife Lola, and accompanied by Tony Shaffer, MG Vallely, Kevin Moore, Tommy Sears and Nagi N. Najjar