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Earlier this week, the campaign of Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., seized upon a column in the New York Post that described Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., as having urged Iraqi leaders in a private meeting to delay coming to an agreement with the Bush administration on the status of U.S. troops. "Obama has tried in private to persuade Iraqi leaders to delay an agreement on a drawdown of the American military presence," Post columnist Amir Taheri wrote, quoting Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, who told the Post that Obama, during his meeting with Iraqi leaders in July, "asked why we were...

Earlier this week, I wrote about the dirty tricks campaign against journalist Amir Taheri following his revelation that, in a private meeting in Iraq last July with Iraqi leaders, Barack Obama tried to persuade them to delay the agreement being hammered out with the US government on a draw-down of the American military presence. According to this account, which quoted Iraq’s foreign minister Hoshya Zebari (pictured), Obama had thus privately sought to undermine an American government foreign policy initiative – an explosive revelation. Taheri subsequently dismissed as tendentious Camp Obama’s response which he said deliberately confused two separate agreements under...

(Reuters) - France has ordered special forces to protect uranium sites run by state-owned Areva in Niger as the threat of attacks on its interests rises after its intervention against rebels in Mali, a military source said on Thursday. ... Seven workers, including five French nationals, were kidnapped in Arlit by al Qaeda's north African arm AQIM in September 2010. It later released three of the hostages but four French citizens are still being held. ... According to a parliamentary committee enquiring into France's supplies of uranium, about 18 percent of the raw material used to power France's 58 nuclear...

WASHINGTON: The problems that plague the Middle East, including Iran's nuclear ambitions and Syria's civil war, require "political, not military" solutions, US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Thursday. Saying the "old order" was vanishing in the region, Hagel stressed in a speech that the United States would work to promote democratic reform while bearing in mind the "limitations" of American power. Although the Pentagon chief made clear that Washington had not ruled out potential military action against Iran or Syria, his remarks highlighted President Barack Obama's cautious stance on resorting to armed force in the volatile region. He said that...

President Barack Obama delivered an impassioned speech Thursday at the memorial service for victims of the Boston Marathon bombing. But that was to be expected. We all know Obama can give a stem-winder. What wasn’t expected was that this would be by far the toughest week of the Obama presidency—the first time I can remember the president being dealt an unequivocal policy defeat. Only the “shellacking” of the 2010 midterm comes close, and even there a case can be made that achieving the decades-old progressive dream of universal health care was worth losing the House of Representatives and a filibuster-proof...

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel rejected the suggestion that President Barack Obama tapped him to “cut the heart out of the Pentagon,” pointedly reminding lawmakers Thursday that Congress approved the smaller, deficit-driven military budgets long before he took the job. Faced with a $487 billion budget cut over a decade, Hagel and Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the Pentagon had no choice in drawing up the politically unpopular reductions in the president's proposed $526.6 billion budget for next year. The blueprint calls for another round of domestic base closures, higher health care fees for...

United States Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel will visit Israel April 21, according to IDF Radio. … According to IDF Radio, the subject of Iran will likely top the agenda of the visit, as will the deterioration in Syria. Hagel will likely use the visit to try and shake free of his anti-Israel image, the radio station added. …

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel called for the Defense Department to be organized more efficiently than it was under Ronald Reagan after raising the possibility of cuts in pay and benefits for military members. Hagel blamed the prospective cuts on sequestration. “[F]iscal realities demand another hard look at personnel – how many people we have both military and civilian, how many we need, what these people do, and how we compensate them for their work, service, and loyalty with pay, benefits and health care,” Hagel said at the National Defense University today. He also hinted at cutting jobs for military brass....

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on Thursday that North Korea's provocative actions and belligerent tone had "ratcheted up the danger" on the Korean peninsula, but he denied that the United States had aggravated the situation by flying stealth bombers to the region. "We have to take seriously every provocative, bellicose word and action that this new young leader has taken so far" since coming to power, Hagel told a Pentagon news conference, referring to Kim Jong-un.

The Uriminzokkiri website, linked to the regime, mentioned targets including Yeonpyeong island, which was attacked by Northern forces in 2010. Pyongyang has made a series of threats since its last nuclear test in February prompted the UN to tighten sanctions. The US said on Friday it would refocus missile defences to its west coast to counter the North's threats. Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel said 14 more batteries would be placed in Alaska by 2017, adding to 30 already in place along the coast.

- A suicide bomber wearing a vest bomb struck outside the Afghan defense ministry on Saturday, killing at least 10 people in a blast just hours after Chuck Hagel, the new United States defense secretary, arrived here in Kabul. And a short time later, another suicide bomber detonated his explosive in eastern Afghanistan before reaching his target, but killed eight children and a policeman, according to Afghan military and hospital officials.

Former Senator Chuck Hagel's confirmation as secretary of defence last week was important for several reasons, many of which have been exhaustively examined by media commentators in the US. But for Arab-Americans, there was another reason to celebrate the final vote: it represented vindication. I have known Mr Hagel for many years, and while there are areas where we have disagreed, I have always respected and valued his insights and his willingness to engage in thoughtful and reasoned discourse. I have also appreciated the fact that he never shied away from appearing before and sharing his views at Arab-American community...

Democrats and the media have accuses Tea Party favorite Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) of "McCarthyism" merely for posing tough questions to and about Chuck Hagel during the latter's confirmation as Secretary of Defense. Yet a recent column by former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich reveals who the real McCarthyites are in U.S. politics today, as Reich likens the Tea Party to a conspiracy "to undermine the government of the United States." Reich, who has steadfastly supported President Barack Obama's big-government, tax-and-spend agenda, wrote that the Tea Party had "infiltrated" the government at every level, and had used the budget cuts...

Republicans and Democrats are blaming one another for impending cuts to the defense budget brought about by sequestration. But with serial annual deficits of $1 trillion-plus and an aggregate debt nearing $17 trillion, the United States -- like an insolvent Rome and exhausted Great Britain of the past -- was bound to re-examine its expensive overseas commitments and strategic profile. The president's nomination of Chuck Hagel for defense secretary was a sort of Zen-like way of having a Republican combat veteran orchestrate a reduced military. In fact, Barack Obama has nurtured a broad and diverse constituency for his neo-isolationist vision....

On her MSNBC show today, Andrea Mitchell accused Republicans of "red-baiting" Chuck Hagel, a reference to tactics most notably associated with the McCarthy period during which people were accused [often accurately, it should be noted] of Communist or affiliated sympathies. Such cries of McCarthyism have of course become standard liberal fare when it comes to Hagel's confirmation process. View the video here.

LTC West interviews General Boykin on national defense issues.

It’s official. Former Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel is our new Secretary of Defense. What challenges does he face as he takes over the Defense Department? Here's the truth: a broken Pentagon is in desperate need of an overhaul. Let’s start with the draconian budget reductions facing DoD as the “sequester” looms. If the sequester happens this week it will, for better or worse, have a direct impact on a full spectrum of Pentagon operations. For starters, the sequester will cut about $1 trillion dollars out of the Pentagon budget. That money will disappear without any considerations regarding either national security...

Chuck Hagel won confirmation Tuesday to become defense secretary over objections to his views on Middle East security and the administration’s handling of an attack on a U.S. consulate in Libya. On a 58 to 41 vote, the Senate confirmed the former GOP senator as four Republicans joined 54 Democrats in approving Hagel, ending a nearly two-month battle that included an unprecedented filibuster against the nominee. The four Republican senators voting in favor were Thad Cochran (Miss.), Mike Johanns (Neb.), Richard C. Shelby (Ala.) and Rand Paul (Ky.). All 41 no votes came from Republicans. The vote marked a foreign...

I told you the yays would be closer to 70 than to 60. Final tally: 71-27. You didn't seriously think these losers would go to the mat to block a nominee just because he's manifestly unqualified, did you?Eighteen Republicans voted yes, according to Fox's Chad Pergram. The roll of glory: R's voting to end debate on Hagel: Alexander, Ayotte, Blunt, Burr, Chambliss, Coburn, Cochran, Collins, Corker, Flake, Graham, Hatch ...— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) February 26, 2013 R’s voting to end debate on Hagel (con’t): Johanns, McCain, Murkowski, Sessions, Shelby and Thune.— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) February 26, 2013 Remember, Maverick has...

On the eve of a Senate vote to confirm Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense, a 2009 report co-authored by Hagel has surfaced titled “A Last Chance For A Two-State Israel-Palestine Agreement.” It called for Israel to make “the hard compromises and painful concessions for peace” without asking anything comparable from the Palestinian side. Indeed, the report warned against “the Jewish-American and Christian Zionist groups that feel comfortable amplifying the positions of Israeli politicians hostile to hard compromise and painful concession.” One of Hagel’s principal co-signatories on the report was Zbigniew Brzezinski, who had advised Obama on foreign policy during...

As press secretary to President Obama, Robert Gibbs was often in the obfuscation business. Now that he's been freed from that role and become a news analyst—albeit at MSNBC—Gibbs has become considerably more candid. Readers will recall, for example, that he described Chuck Hagel as "unimpressive and unprepared" at his Senate confirmation hearing. Today, Gibbs took that frankness a significant step further. On Up With Chris Hayes, Gibbs stated that as press secretary, he had been ordered not to acknowledge the existence of the drone program. View the video here.

MAHER: Based on every statement I’ve heard out of any Republican in the last two years, the Israelis are controlling our government. (Daily Caller’s James) WEINSTEIN: Not the State Department, that’s for sure. (HBO’s Real Time, February 15, 2013) …

Former Sen. Chuck Hagel declined to sign a letter circulated by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in 2007 calling upon then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to press Arab allies of the U.S. to recognize Israel’s right to exist “and not use such recognition as a bargaining chip for future Israeli concessions.” Seventy-nine Senators eventually signed the letter, which was sponsored by Schumer and by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).

Chuck Hagel’s archive is housed here at the University of Nebraska-Omaha. But despite his nomination for secretary of defense, reporters, as well as the public writ large, are being denied access to the thousands of papers, speeches, audio and video files, and artifacts in the archive ... university officials yesterday indicated that if Hagel himself were to grant this reporter access to the archives, his request would be granted.

A brand new conservative group calling itself Americans for a Strong Defense and financed by anonymous donors is running advertisements urging Democratic senators in five states to vote against Chuck Hagel, President Obama’s nominee to be secretary of defense, saying he would make the United States “a weaker country.” Another freshly minted and anonymously backed organization, Use Your Mandate, which presents itself as a liberal gay rights group but purchases its television time through a prominent Republican firm, is attacking Mr. Hagel as “anti-Gay,” “anti-woman” and “anti-Israel” in ads and mailers. Those groups are joining at least five others that...

If nothing else, the congressional break for the week of Presidents’ Day is a cooling-off period for the fight over former Sen. Chuck Hagel’s nomination to be secretary of defense. Questions about President Obama’s handling of the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, which killed four Americans, including the US ambassador – an issue, by the way, which Mr. Hagel had nothing to do with – are being answered to the apparent satisfaction of Republicans … at least to the point where they’re willing to end their de facto filibuster of Hagel’s nomination. snip Sen. Graham, along with Sen. John McCain,...

WHEN a Vesuvius like John McCain tells you that you belch too much smoke and spew too much fire, you know you’ve got a problem. And Ted Cruz, a Republican freshman in the Senate who has been front and center in his party’s effort to squash Chuck Hagel’s nomination as secretary of defense, has a problem. He’s an ornery, swaggering piece of work. Just six weeks since his arrival on Capitol Hill, he’s already known for his naysaying, his nit-picking and his itch to upbraid lawmakers who are vastly senior to him, who have sacrificed more than he has and...

From a "live chat" Obama had yesterday afternoon. He corrected himself to say "Purple Hearts." Simply a slip of the tongue or yet another evidence of profound and invincible ignorance?

Chuck Hagel's nomination to be secretary of defense is in trouble -- as it should be. The former Republican senator has so much baggage it is amazing that the administration hasn't dumped him, as they did Susan Rice when her proposed nomination ran into trouble. Unfortunately, having won that battle, the GOP may be in weaker position to defeat another Obama nominee. And Rice, her misstatements about the attack on Benghazi notwithstanding, would have been a less dangerous cabinet member than Hagel. Hagel has made clearly anti-Semitic statements before public forums time and again. If his target had been, say,...

Sen. Ted Cruz lost his voice a couple days ago. Some senators probably wish it wouldn’t come back — at least for a little while. In six short weeks since he became the junior Texas GOP senator, the no-nonsense freshman has quickly become a lightning rod — on issues ranging from guns to Chuck Hagel’s nomination for defense secretary — upending the Senate’s conventional ways, in which freshmen typically work quietly to build bridges with their colleagues. Cruz’s sharp-elbowed Senate style underscores the dilemma facing Republicans as they seek a way out of the political wilderness: Rising stars like Cruz,...

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul’s vote to temporarily block Chuck Hagel’s nomination for secretary of defense elicited blowback from an unlikely source: antiwar conservatives and libertarians, many of them supporters of his father’s GOP presidential campaign. Paul, the son of former Texas Republican Rep. Ron Paul, joined all but four Republican senators Thursday in voting against a motion to end debate over Hagel’s nomination. GOP leaders are saying that they will not filibuster Hagel indefinitely, but instead want to delay a vote until they have more information about his speeches and finances. “That is also why I voted to not...

Two U.S. senators have written a letter to Chuck Hagel to ask the defense secretary nominee to explain his assertion that "the State Department was becoming an adjunct of the Israeli Foreign Ministry." Hagel, the Washington Free Beacon reported yesterday, made the comment in 2007. "Dear Senator Hagel," Senators Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte write. "Yesterday, the Washington Free Beacon reported that in a 2007 speech at Rutgers University regarding America's relationship with the Middle East you remarked that 'the State Department was becoming an adjunct of the Israeli Foreign Ministry.' According to notes posted on the internet by a...

<p>Obama — ticked off by Rice’s treatment and still emboldened by his convincing victory over Mitt Romney — courted confrontation when he tapped Hagel.</p> <p>If true, this is outlandish. The president would imperil national security out of spite? .........</p>

Andrea Mitchell/Barack Obama: same struggle! In an stunningly blatant display of solidarity with the Obama line, Andrea Mitchell declared on today's Morning Joe that she shared the same "concern" with the White House: that poor Chuck Hagel wouldn't get a final vote on his nomination. Mitchell prefaced her "concern" by roundly condemning Republicans in general--and Senator Ted Cruz in particular--for supposedly attacking Hagel with allegations "completely unsupported by fact." Could somebody please tell me why Mitchell, supposedly a reporter, should so shamelessly be toting the White House's water this way? View the video here.

An attempt by Senate Democrats to push through their controversial nominee for defense secretary, former Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., failed today on a 58-40 vote as Republicans said they haven’t been given answers to their questions. Among his opponents are 14 retired U.S. admirals and generals, including high-profile names such as Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin and Maj. Gen. Paul E. Vallely. Hagel has endorsed subjecting the U.S. to the U.N.’s International Criminal Court, and he’s sat on the board of numerous globalist groups promoting U.S. funding for the Third World.

Senate Republicans blocked a vote on Chuck Hagel’s nomination as secretary of defense on Thursday, launching an unprecedented filibuster and a severe rebuke to the White House. Falling one vote shy of the 60 needed to move forward on the nomination, the Hagel filibuster brought stark condemnations from President Obama and Senate Democrats for its precedent-setting nature -- the first time a defense secretary nominee had been filibustered. The setback came during what many believe is a critical period for the Pentagon as it winds down troops from Afghanistan and implements costly budget cuts. It was also a hard slap...

The Senate is embroiled in another dog fight this week. For the first time in American history, it appears we will have a filibuster of a Presidential nominee for Secretary of Defense. The full Senate is expected to vote on the nomination of Chuck Hagel this Friday. Democrats are claiming to have enough votes to confirm Hagel, but Republicans are planning to block the vote with a filibuster. The filibuster is being led by Republican Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma and is supported by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham from South Carolina along with other Republican senators. Republicans have raised serious...

The reviews are in for Chuck Hagel’s appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee. If he were a Broadway play, as opposed to a mere nominee for Defense Secretary, Hagel would close after one performance. The Obama administration was not amused. White House officials told CBS’ Major Garrett that they were disappointed with Hagel’s performance. Indeed, one Obama staffer described Hagel’s testimony on Iran as “somewhere between baffling and incomprehensible.”

On September 11, 2012 four Americans, including Ambassador Christopher Stevens were murdered in Benghazi, Libya. Five months have passed since that fateful day and we still do not have an accounting for Obama's whereabouts during the seven hour firefight in Benghazi. What we do know however, is that Obama failed in his duty to come to the aid of incredibly brave Americans in distress. We know now that not only did Obama not call an in-person emergency meeting in the Situation Room (hence no 'Situation Room photo' during Benghazi) or ANY room, his re-election was more important to him than...

Senator Roy Blunt indicated Wednesday that there are enough votes in the Senate to delay the Hagel confirmation.

Senator Ted Cruz grilled Obama defense chief nominee Chuck Hagel over his controversial appearance on Al Jazeera, the Arab propaganda channel, during which the former Republican Senator had agreed with a viewer that the United States was a "bully" in global affairs. It has now been revealed that the government of Qatar, which owns Al Jazeera, was a major contributor to the Atlantic Council when Hagel was its chairman. But Hagel also has an Al Jazeera connection through Georgetown University, where he is a professor, and which maintains a campus in Qatar.

How the CIA Funds Anti-Bush Propaganda By Bill Gertz The Washington Times | September 14, 2004 The CIA's Counterterrorist Center has spent more than $15 million in the past three years funding studies, reports and conferences produced by former Democratic administration officials and other critics of the Bush administration. The latest effort was a $300,000 grant by the CIA to the Atlantic Council for a study co-authored by Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism official who wrote a best seller accusing the Bush administration of failing in the war on terrorism by invading Iraq.

Multiple foreign corporations that have bypassed or attempted to bypass United States and European Union sanctions against Iran are funding the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank chaired by defense secretary nominee Chuck Hagel. One council sponsor, Italian oil company Eni, has vehemently defended its trade with Iran, saying it was “proud” of its cooperation with the regime. “Given the existence of foreign pressures, implementation of most projects in Iran is challenging and complicated,” Eni’s Executive Vice President Guido Michelotti told reporters during a 2011 visit to Iran. “Yet, we have always been interested in cooperation with the Iranian side...

See Video of Levin Statement at: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21134540/vp/50784625#50784625

Stop the Confirmation of Chuck Hagel for Secretary of DefenseClick here: https://www.votervoice.net/JBS/Campaigns/30628/Respond Confirming Chuck Hagel for secretary of defense may harm U.S. defense considering his record, words of praise from the Communist Party, and ties to far-left progressive organizations. Chuck Hagel a Committed Internationalist The New American 11 February 2013 The confirmation vote for Republican former senator of Nebraska Chuck Hagel (shown) to replace outgoing Leon Panetta as secretary of defense was postponed by another week after Hagel failed to meet the expectations of his former Republican colleagues during last week's Senate confirmation hearings. Even more troubling than Sen. Hagel's...

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) on Sunday threatened to filibuster former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.)'s nomination for Defense secretary, if necessary to prevent his confirmation. “I want a 60-vote margin and you don’t have to filibuster to get that,” said Inhofe in an interview on Fox News. “I would threaten to cause a 60-vote margin. If it took a filibuster, I’d do it that way.” Inhofe, the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said that requiring 60 votes to confirm nominees was common and dismissed suggestions that GOP colleagues would be reluctant to back him. Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/defcon-hill/policy-and-strategy/282153-sen-inhofe-threatens-filibuster-of-hagel#ixzz2KYLsXDEC Follow...

Remember when the mainstream media mocked a politician who had to attend five colleges to graduate, whose academic record was less than outstanding, and whose subsequent success was proof of nothing? Remember how that was supposed to be a threat to national security, the economy, and so much else? That was so 2008, so Sarah Palin. It turns out that former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), who is now awaiting confirmation as Secretary of Defense, attended five colleges and was a "D" student. He volunteered to serve in Vietnam,

New footage of a speech by Chuck Hagel in 2008 has surfaced, in which the former Senator mocked the idea of continuing the U.S. policy of confronting Iran and supporting Israel. "When I hear the talk about--well you can’t talk with Iran, you can’t talk with Syria and we’re, we should stay where we are and support Israel, and so on, well you miss the point," he told the laughing audience at an event for his book, America: Our Next Chapter. Hagel added that the U.S. "shouldn't even be thinking about the options of bombing Iran," even in the event...

The main purpose of US President Barack Obama's visit to Israel in the spring is to warn Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu against attacking Iran, unnamed officials told Army Radio on Sunday. According to the officials, the urgency of the trip is because in his speech to the United Nations in September, Netanyahu had flagged the spring of 2013 as a significant time in the context of the Iranian nuclear threat.

On Thursday, Senate sources told Breitbart News exclusively that they have been informed that one of the reasons that President Barack Obama’s nominee for Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel, has not turned over requested documents on his sources of foreign funding is that one of the names listed is a group purportedly called “Friends of Hamas.” Yesterday, 25 senators sent a letter to Hagel demanding information on his foreign funding. Hagel has refused all such requests, prompting the senators to state, “in the judgment of the undersigned, a Committee vote on your nomination should not occur unless and until you...