Having spent the larger amount of two years digging through innocuous reports, FOIA documents, and media reports (mostly foreign), the Gowdy announcement today is more than a little bit disingenuous.
We’ve previously predicted, long before the select committee was announced, that the Benghazi investigation would amount to all hat and no cattle.
The reasoning is very simple:
Both sides of the UniParty were charged with intelligence oversight of the joint CIA/State Department operations in Libya (2011) and Syria (2012) through the Congressional Intelligence Gang-of-Eight.
At the time the “Intelligence Gang-of-Eight” was:

♦ Speaker – John Boehner, ♦ Minority Leader – Nancy Pelosi; ♦ House Permanent Select Committee on Intel Chairman – Mike Rogers, and his ♦ Democrat counterpart Charles Ruppersberger; ♦ Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and ♦ Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid; along with ♦ Senate Intel Chair Diane Feinstein and her ♦ Republican counterpart, Saxby Chambliss.

Together with Hillary Clinton and President Obama the “Gang-of-Eight” was duplicitous in everything that took place.  Therefore there is no independent motive for the Gowdy committee to find any responsibility – the entire investigation is for public appearances only.
Further evidence therein can be found in this latest press release.  Note the specific wording and the specific emphasis we provide:  (more…)

Former Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown interviewed candidate Donald Trump on the radio earlier today:

Actions Speak Louder Than Words – This is an older interview with Ivanka Trump from October of 2015.  However, within the interview you see why the progressive left (within Hillary Clinton Camp) is desperately afraid of Donald Trump.
Candidate Donald Trump has an actual history of empowering, advancing, and promoting strong women within his organization.  Everything about Ivanka Trump runs completely counter to the narrative the progressive left need to advance Clinton.
In this interview Ivanka absolutely destroys the archetype ‘sexism’ approach:

“You don’t lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case.” – Ken Kesey

(Via Foreign Policy) Donald Trump has spent much of his campaign deriding NATO allies for “ripping off” the American taxpayer and failing to contribute to the world’s most powerful military alliance. But on Wednesday, his fellow Republicans joined the chorus during a closed-door meeting with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on Capitol Hill, according to sources inside the room.
For under an hour, senators grilled Stoltenberg, a former prime minister of Norway, about why only five members of the 28-nation club spend at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense, the official amount NATO recommends each nation set aside. Some expressed particular dissatisfaction with Germany, the fourth largest economy in the world, which does not meet the 2 percent threshold.
(more…)

Paul Manafort is Donald Trump’s delegate and convention manager.  He spoke to CNN today about the state of the race:

In an effort to keep the Daily Open Thread a little more open topic we are going to start a new daily thread for “2016 Presidential Politics”. Please use this thread to post anything relating to the Presidential Race and/or any of the candidates therein.

This thread will refresh daily and appear above the Open Discussion Thread.

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL.
For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen †

If you have ever looked deeply into what created the financial pension crisis in Puerto Rico you’d have to admit the potential for a federal bailout is beyond absurd.  But that won’t stop the insufferable liberals from proposing such a possibility – and watch closely as House Speaker Paul Ryan begins to discuss the “outcome for the bond-holders”.
Former presidential candidate Marco Rubio already stated he was in favor of a bailout, albeit with conditions; and we know the Democrats will always look to gain political leverage through the advocacy of the fiscally stupid…. 

NEW YORK — Over a dozen activists descended on a building where Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen and her three living predecessors were speaking on Thursday to demand that the Fed bail out Puerto Rico’s cash-strapped government.
The demonstrators, who are affiliated with the progressive Fed Up coalition, distributed Puerto Rican flags and empanadas as Puerto Rican music played outside Manhattan’s International House, a student residence. Yellen was there for an extremely rare panel discussion alongside past Fed chairs Ben Bernanke, Paul Volcker and Alan Greenspan, who participated via videostream. (more…)

H/t: Menagerie

(Via The Observer) The revelations of the so-called Panama Papers that are roiling the world’s political and financial elites this week include important facts about Team Clinton. This unprecedented trove of documents purloined from a shady Panama law firm that arranged tax havens, and perhaps money laundering, for the globe’s super-rich includes juicy insights into how Russia’s elite hides its ill-gotten wealth.

Almost lost among the many revelations is the fact that Russia’s biggest bank uses The Podesta Group as its lobbyist in Washington, DC. Though hardly a household name, this firm is well known inside the Beltway, not least because its CEO is Tony Podesta, one of the best-connected Democratic machers in the country. (more…)