White House Communications Director Ben Rhodes must really be annoyed with Secretary John Kerry this week.
Kerry and Wallace got into a heated exchange:

WASHINGTON DC – U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday called for a halt to “dangerous” levels of violence in Libya after militia clashes in Tripoli closed the country’s main airport, destroyed most planes parked there, and prompted the United Nations to evacuate its staff.
In some of the worst violence in months, at least 15 people have been killed in clashes in Tripoli and the eastern city of Benghazi since Sunday, and a Libyan official said several Grad rockets hit the Tripoli International Airport on Monday, damaging the control tower.
With its new government struggling to impose order since the 2011 rebellion that ousted Muammar Gaddafi, Libya is sliding deeper into turmoil with rival brigades of former rebels battling for political and economic power. (more…)

A recent report into the inside contacts surrounding a Hamas / Israeli negotiated ceasefire confirms –with exact precision– what we predicted was happening at the time.

(Via WFB) Secretary of State John Kerry offered numerous times to fly to Cairo or Jerusalem to assist in cease-fire negotiations but was told that the sides “didn’t need American mediation,” according to an account of events by Haaretz.
Senior Israeli officials told Haaretz that Kerry offered to come to directly join the talks in each and every call during the attempted brokering of a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas on Monday, but was “politely rejected” by all sides.
Egypt wanted to prove that it could play its traditional diplomatic role with regards to Gaza without U.S. assistance. Israel thought that a visit by Kerry would make it look like the United States pressured Israel to make a deal, which would have been a public relations victory for Hamas. (more…)

Huh, funny that….  I wonder if they underwrite Chelsea’s $75,000+ speaking fees too ?
(Via WFB) The Clinton Foundation and the terror group Hamas share a key donor: The government of Qatar, a leading backer of terror groups that has emerged in recent years as Hamas’ chief financial lifeline.
Qatar, which has been designated by the State Department as a “significant terrorist financing risk,” has pledged more than $400 million to Hamas since 2012 and has long harbored one of the terror group’s senior leaders, Khaled Mashaal.
At the same time, Qatar has sought to curry favor with elite Westerners, donating between $1 million and $5 million through 2013 to the Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton Foundation.
The foundation has been dogged by ethical questions over its willingness to accept money from questionable sources, including authoritarian regimes such as Kuwait and Oman.
(more…)

(Via The Hill) A federal judge on Wendesday ordered that the suspected ringleader in the 2012 Benghazi attacks be held in prison without bond.

…“did knowingly and intentionally conspire and agree with other conspirators, known and unknown to provide material support and resources to terrorists, that is personnel including himself and others.”  (link)

Federal prosecutors said Ahmed Abu Khattala needed to be detained because of his extremist connections and his expressed desire to harm U.S. citizens.
“Given the defendant’s proclivity for violence as well as his ability to readily communicate with other similar-minded individuals, as demonstrated by his status as a commander of an extremist brigade, his detention is the only means available to neutralize that threat,” prosecutors said in a court filing late Tuesday.  (more…)

….Make sure you note the comments from C.A.P. (Center for American Progress).  For them to be critical of Obama’s Libya policy is ironic considering Denis McDonough, an institute fellow, was a central character in the policy used.
WASHINGTON — A group of U.S. diplomats arrived in Libya three years ago to a memorable reception: a throng of cheering men and women who pressed in on the startled group “just to touch us and thank us,” recalled Susan Rice, President Barack Obama’s national security adviser.
The Libyans were emotional because the U.S. and its allies had toppled leader Moammar Gadhafi in a military campaign that averted a feared slaughter of Gadhafi’s foes. Obama administration officials called the international effort, accomplished with no Western casualties, a “model intervention.”
But in three years Libya has turned into the kind of place U.S. officials most fear: a lawless land that attracts terrorists, pumps out illegal arms and drugs, and destabilizes its neighbors.
Now, as Obama considers a limited military intervention in Iraq, the Libya experience is seen by many as a cautionary tale of the unintended damage big powers can inflict when they aim for a limited involvement in an unpredictable conflict. (more…)

This will throw a pickle in the grand scheme of Ketchup Kerry.  With al-Qaeda essentially conceding the more radical ISIL Army is the more powerful Islamist force – the Ideological alignment within Syria leaves barely a ‘smidgen’ of room for moderation.   Of course this merge begs the question how long will Russia stay de-facto aligned to Assad? 

SYRIA – A Syrian rebel group closely aligned with al Qaeda’s official central leadership has switched sides and is now supporting an ultra-violent offshoot, following the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant’s blitzkrieg attack on Iraq, according to U.S. officials and reports from the region.
A local unit of the Al Nusra Front—the official rebel group of al Qaeda in Syria—agreed to back the ISIL on Wednesday.
The merger of one portion of al Nusra with ISIL is being viewed by government intelligence analysts and others as a troubling indicator that the inner battle between the two groups may be shifting in ISIL’s favor. (more…)

There are two main Islamic fighting forces, and six main factions within those fighting forces, inside Syria – all fighting against Assad.   None of them are remotely “moderate”.   But for context let me remind you of what the John’s (Kerry and McCain) consider “moderate”:

(Left) John McCain meeting with ISIS forces in Syria while he thought he was in the company of the FSA (Free Syrian Army) D’oh.   And (right) John Kerry meeting with Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood “moderate” Morsi while he was lopping off the heads of Coptic Christians.

JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Secretary of State John Kerry signaled on Friday that the U.S. hopes to enlist moderate Syrian opposition fighters that the Obama administration has reluctantly decided to arm and train in the battle against militant extremists in neighboring Iraq.
Obama sent Congress a $500 million request Thursday for a Pentagon-run program that would significantly expand previous covert efforts to arm rebels fighting both the Sunni extremists and forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad. The move that comes amid increased U.S. concern that the conflicts in Syria and Iraq are becoming an intertwined fight against the same Sunni extremist group. (more…)

After two weeks they’ve sold far less than 150,00 copies of Hard Choices (Possibly as low as 120,000 and that’s counting ebooks).  Numerous earlier reports reflected that Simon & Schuster printed a million advance copies, and paid Clinton a $14 million advance.
This is a MAJOR failure….  In the publishing world “A Historic failure”.
WASHINGTON – Sales of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s new memoir, “Hard Choices,” declined 43.5 percent to 48,000 copies in its second week on the shelves, according to Nielsen BookScan.
The sales figures put pressure on the publisher, Simon & Schuster, which paid Mrs. Clinton a multimillion-dollar advance to write about her time at the State Department and has invested heavily in the book’s rollout, one of the biggest of the year.
About 85,000 copies were sold in the week after the book’s June 10 release, according to BookScan, a subscription service that tracks sales at over 80 percent of book vendors in the United States. Those figures do not include e-books, which increased sales by about 15 percent, to roughly 100,000 electronic and hardcover copies. (more…)