I don’t understand why this site doesn’t like the White House Insider because it indicated long ago that Panetta made the decision.
Please Lord give us strength against our enemies and lead us to destroy them as you see fit, Lord. Amen.
Yes, when you add that timing of the “Friday afternoon Panetta green light”, to the “Later that day, he(McRaven) met with a six-member congressional delegation”,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/adm-william-mcraven-the-terrorist-hunter-on-whose-shoulders-osama-bin-laden-raid-rested/2011/05/04/AFsEv4rF_print.html
to the Pat Dollard web-site account of events; the time line seems to favor Panetta being the go ahead guy. I’d guess Rush has a separate source and he isn’t going to reference it in favor of letting them speak for their self, if they’d wish to. I’m sure a cub reporter could get to the bottom of it...probably doesn’t matter except if the Romney campaign wished to counter the ad saying he wouldn’t have gave the go-ahead.
May 3, 2011, excerpt from;
http://patdollard.com/2011/05/obama-hesitated-%E2%80%93-panetta-issued-order-to-kill-osama-bin-laden/
“This insulation ended at some point with an abort order that I believe originated from Valerie Jarretts office, and was then followed up by President Obama. This abort order was later explained as a delay due to weather conditions, but the actual conditions at that time would have been acceptable for the mission. A storm system had been in the area earlier, but was no longer an issue. Check the data yourself to confirm. Jarrett, having been caught off guard, was now scrambling to determine who had initiated the plan. She was furious, repeating the acronym CoC and saying it was not being followed. This is where Bill Daley intervened directly. The particulars of that intervention are not clear to me beyond knowing he did meet with Jarrett in his office and following that meeting, Valerie Jarrett was not seen in the West Wing for some time, and apparently no longer offered up any resistance to the Osama Bin Laden mission. What did follow from there was one or more brief meetings between Bill Daley, Hillary Clinton, a representative from Robert Gates office, a representative from Leon Panettas office, and a representative from Jim Clappers office. I have to assume that these meetings were in essence, detailing the move to proceed with the operation against the Osama Bin Laden compound. I have been told by more than one source that Leon Panetta was directing the operation with both his own CIA operatives, as well as direct contacts with military both entities were reporting to Panetta only at this point, and not the President of the United States. There was not going to be another delay as had happened 24 hour earlier. The operation was at this time effectively unknown to President Barack Obama or Valerie Jarrett and it remained that way until AFTER it had already been initiated. President Obama was literally pulled from a golf outing and escorted back to the White House to be informed of the mission. Upon his arrival there was a briefing held which included Bill Daley, John Brennan, and a high ranking member of the military. When Obama emerged from the briefing, he was described as looking very confused and uncertain. The president was then placed in the situation room where several of the players in this event had already been watching the operation unfold. Another interesting tidbit regarding this is that the Vice President was already up to speed on the operation. A source indicated they believe Hillary Clinton had personally made certain the Vice President was made aware of that days events before the president was. The now famous photo released shows the particulars of that of that room and its occupants. What that photo does not communicate directly is that the military personnel present in that room during the operation unfolding, deferred to either Hillary Clinton or Robert Gates.”