By The Editorial Board
Posted at 12:01 AM
Netflix recently announced a deal with former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, which will feature the Obamas working both in front of the camera and behind it. Perhaps instead of video production, though, our previous president should become a writer. As shown last week, he’s already skilled at crafting fiction.
Speaking in Las Vegas, Obama told a crowd of tech execs, “I didn’t have scandals, which seems like it shouldn’t be something you brag about.” “If you look at the history of the modern presidency,” he continued, “coming out of the modern presidency without anybody going to jail is really good. It’s a big deal.”
Well, that line — which Obama began preaching even before President Donald Trump was inaugurated in January 2017 — would be a big deal if it were true. But then again, the national media by and large determine what is and isn’t scandalous, based on what draws their attention, and Obama sycophants in journalism and our political culture certainly have worked diligently to convince us our 44th president was as pure as driven snow. The fact that he can say that and the gurus at Politifact or FactCheck.org didn’t immediately whirl into action to dispute it shows just how effective they’ve been.
Still, we disagree with Obama about his scandal-free legacy. Consider some screw-ups that got people killed.
In October 2009 federal law enforcement agents renewed and retooled a Bush administration gun-running scheme. Known as Fast and Furious, the feds’ operation permitted straw purchases of guns in Phoenix for shipment into Mexico. In December 2010 Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed a shootout with a band of illegal immigrants who obtained guns traced to Fast and Furious. In 2015 more of those weapons surfaced when used by a pair of Muslim gunmen who shot a security guard in seeking to crash an irreverent “Draw Muhammad” contest in Texas; they were killed by an off-duty police officer.
On Sept. 11, 2012, terrorists attacked the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya. The U.S. ambassador and three other Americans died. Obama administration officials, including then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, immediately blamed the attack on spontaneous outrage over an anti-Muslim video. But Clinton, for example, privately blamed al-Qaida and noted in a Sept. 12, 2012, email the attack “had nothing to do with the film.” Additionally, it was later revealed that four senior State Department officials had refused requests to beef up security at the Benghazi complex before the attack.
Speaking of al-Qaida, we can all cheer Obama for dispatching SEAL Team 6 to Pakistan to dispatch Osama bin Laden to the afterlife. But under Obama, drone strikes by the U.S. military killed at least four Americans overseas, including one born in Florida. Some were suspected terrorists and some were collateral damage killed during attacks on terrorists. Obama personally ordered a deadly drone strike on a Muslim preacher named Anwar al-Awlaki, who was a U.S. citizen, instead of seeking to capture and prosecute him.
And in June 2014 the public learned that the Veterans Administration was fudging records on 120,000 veterans’ medical appointments. Those vets were denied timely care, or were not cared for at all, resulting in the death of at least 35 veterans in Phoenix alone.
But enough of the morbid stuff. Let’s look at more routine malfeasance.
The Obama administration, supposedly in the name of national security, spied on or seized records from reporters at Fox News, the Associated Press and CBS News, and threatened a New York Times reporter with prison for not revealing a source who allegedly slipped him classified information.
James Clapper, Obama’s national intelligence director, and John Brennan, Obama’s CIA chief, both lied to Congress about spying on everyday Americans and Senate staffers. Former Democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich claims U.S. intelligence officials wiretapped him in 2011 because of his opposition to Obama’s policy in Libya.
In addition, Obama scuttled an FBI investigation into drug-trafficking by Hezbollah before the nuclear deal with Iran was finalized; IRS officials targeted conservative groups seeking tax exempt status ahead of the 2012 election; the National Labor Relations Board during Obama’s eight years reversed a combined 4,600 years of precedent by overturning long-held rulings; the Justice Department in 2013 began pressuring banks to halt business with gun dealers, payday lenders, pawn shops and others considered unsavory; the Energy Department gave solar-panel maker Solyndra a $535 million taxpayer-backed loan in 2009, yet the firm went belly up two years later; in 2014 the administration swapped five Taliban fighters for convicted Army deserter Bowe Bergdahl.
We’re not saying the national media did not report on these things. But these episodes, and others, got nowhere near the intense negative coverage of all things Trump.
A scandal typically may be in the eye of the beholder. Obama hid his scandals in plain sight, including the claim there were no scandals, and yet he and most of the media still cannot see them.
Posted at 12:01 AM
Netflix recently announced a deal with former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, which will feature the Obamas working both in front of the camera and behind it. Perhaps instead of video production, though, our previous president should become a writer. As shown last week, he’s already skilled at crafting fiction.
Speaking in Las Vegas, Obama told a crowd of tech execs, “I didn’t have scandals, which seems like it shouldn’t be something you brag about.” “If you look at the history of the modern presidency,” he continued, “coming out of the modern presidency without anybody going to jail is really good. It’s a big deal.”
Well, that line — which Obama began preaching even before President Donald Trump was inaugurated in January 2017 — would be a big deal if it were true. But then again, the national media by and large determine what is and isn’t scandalous, based on what draws their attention, and Obama sycophants in journalism and our political culture certainly have worked diligently to convince us our 44th president was as pure as driven snow. The fact that he can say that and the gurus at Politifact or FactCheck.org didn’t immediately whirl into action to dispute it shows just how effective they’ve been.
Still, we disagree with Obama about his scandal-free legacy. Consider some screw-ups that got people killed.
In October 2009 federal law enforcement agents renewed and retooled a Bush administration gun-running scheme. Known as Fast and Furious, the feds’ operation permitted straw purchases of guns in Phoenix for shipment into Mexico. In December 2010 Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed a shootout with a band of illegal immigrants who obtained guns traced to Fast and Furious. In 2015 more of those weapons surfaced when used by a pair of Muslim gunmen who shot a security guard in seeking to crash an irreverent “Draw Muhammad” contest in Texas; they were killed by an off-duty police officer.
On Sept. 11, 2012, terrorists attacked the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya. The U.S. ambassador and three other Americans died. Obama administration officials, including then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, immediately blamed the attack on spontaneous outrage over an anti-Muslim video. But Clinton, for example, privately blamed al-Qaida and noted in a Sept. 12, 2012, email the attack “had nothing to do with the film.” Additionally, it was later revealed that four senior State Department officials had refused requests to beef up security at the Benghazi complex before the attack.
Speaking of al-Qaida, we can all cheer Obama for dispatching SEAL Team 6 to Pakistan to dispatch Osama bin Laden to the afterlife. But under Obama, drone strikes by the U.S. military killed at least four Americans overseas, including one born in Florida. Some were suspected terrorists and some were collateral damage killed during attacks on terrorists. Obama personally ordered a deadly drone strike on a Muslim preacher named Anwar al-Awlaki, who was a U.S. citizen, instead of seeking to capture and prosecute him.
And in June 2014 the public learned that the Veterans Administration was fudging records on 120,000 veterans’ medical appointments. Those vets were denied timely care, or were not cared for at all, resulting in the death of at least 35 veterans in Phoenix alone.
But enough of the morbid stuff. Let’s look at more routine malfeasance.
The Obama administration, supposedly in the name of national security, spied on or seized records from reporters at Fox News, the Associated Press and CBS News, and threatened a New York Times reporter with prison for not revealing a source who allegedly slipped him classified information.
James Clapper, Obama’s national intelligence director, and John Brennan, Obama’s CIA chief, both lied to Congress about spying on everyday Americans and Senate staffers. Former Democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich claims U.S. intelligence officials wiretapped him in 2011 because of his opposition to Obama’s policy in Libya.
In addition, Obama scuttled an FBI investigation into drug-trafficking by Hezbollah before the nuclear deal with Iran was finalized; IRS officials targeted conservative groups seeking tax exempt status ahead of the 2012 election; the National Labor Relations Board during Obama’s eight years reversed a combined 4,600 years of precedent by overturning long-held rulings; the Justice Department in 2013 began pressuring banks to halt business with gun dealers, payday lenders, pawn shops and others considered unsavory; the Energy Department gave solar-panel maker Solyndra a $535 million taxpayer-backed loan in 2009, yet the firm went belly up two years later; in 2014 the administration swapped five Taliban fighters for convicted Army deserter Bowe Bergdahl.
We’re not saying the national media did not report on these things. But these episodes, and others, got nowhere near the intense negative coverage of all things Trump.
A scandal typically may be in the eye of the beholder. Obama hid his scandals in plain sight, including the claim there were no scandals, and yet he and most of the media still cannot see them.
