How these Obama administration officials can continue to balance such sizable obfuscations on the tip of a pin is beyond my comprehension.    Al-Nusra Front is the jihadist arm of al-Qaeda in Syria.

The Al Nusra Front jihadists’ fight alongside, and with, the Free Syrian Army.   Their goals and agenda is exactly the same.  Yet somehow, Secretary Kerry can ideologically parse the FSA as good, and Al-Nusra as bad, and somehow conflate that to claim some kind of U.S. engagement policy will benefit the FSA but yet carve out no benefit for Al-Nusra.

It is important to note in December 2012 the U.S. Administration labeled Al-Nusra Front as a “Terrorist Organization” :

(Via New York Times)  WASHINGTON — The United States has formally designated the Al Nusra Front, the militant Syrian rebel group, as a foreign terrorist organization. (link)

The vote President Obama is now asking to delay, is the vote he previously requested which would have doomed his 2nd term to irrelevance – It was certain to fail.  
From an Obama position of brutally obvious weakness, Russia’s Putin twists President Obama and spins him like a top.    President Obama is going to speak to the nation tonight at 9:00pm. 
The core of how this is taking place is discussed, and what’s potentially at the root of the collapsing messaging, after two media reports:
FIRST FROM DC – President Barack Obama said Tuesday he wants Congress to delay its efforts to vote on authorizing the use of force in response to Syria’s use of chemical weapons until the round of diplomatic efforts that began this week has a chance to play out.
Obama’s comments came at lunch meetings with senators, which followed the administration’s commitment to engage in talks at the United Nations, and as Syria and Russia quickly responded to the action at the UN with their own statements and requests.
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Primary voting day today in New York City.    Mayoral Candidate Anthony Weiner votes without wife, Huma Abedin, at his side.   The media is noting her absence, while I wonder if she is even a U.S citizen.

Full Story HERE

Let me start by saying that I am enthusiastically in favor of using hydraulic fracturing to build a robust domestic energy program.  Until I saw this map, however, I never realized the huge potential in the United States:
My own state of Michigan is literally covered by the Michigan Basin and the Devonian aged Antrim shale deposits.
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Daily Caller (Patrick Howley):

The Daily Caller feels compelled to present our first, and hopefully last, review of the new version of CNN’s vaunted ‘Crossfire.’ For Review #1, we will focus on the show’s Monday debut starring President Obama’s 2012 deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, and guests Sens. Rand Paul and Bob Menendez.
(snip)
A loathsome creature like Stephanie Cutter, the roots jutting out from her blonde dye job as black as the recesses of her soul, can push her way onto national television to sit next to a former Speaker of the House and two sitting U.S. senators. A charmless, dead-eyed, tacky sociopath with no sense of ethics, an empty shell spewing her flat-throated bile without the slightest trace of self-awareness, can beat all of us to the front of the Darwinian line.
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Yid With Lid

If Alan Funt was still alive most of America would looking for him to pop out from somewhere and say “Smile You’re on Candid Camera.”  This president’s foreign policy has been worse than Amateur hour and somewhere in his Kremlin office Vladimir Putin is laughing his arse off at Barack Obama.
Look…at today’s strange occurrences. Please try and read the next run-on paragraph in one breath.

(note…could insert some hard returns to make the following easier to read, but that ruins the point…../sharon)

First while trying to get international approval for attacking Syria John Kerry holds a press conference where he makes an offhanded remark about avoiding military action if Syria gives up its chemical weapons to some sort of international force. Kerry’s comment was as intentional as Obama’s “red line”  Almost immediately the State Department tries to walk back Kerry’s comment saying it was hypothetical. But it was too late because Russia got involved and made the offer to Syria who said they were interested.  Now at this point Kerry and the White House was still crapping all over the idea (you following this?). The former Secretary of State who wants to be President  just happens to be in Washington DC to pick up a liberty award on the anniversary of when she allowed four Americans who worked for her to be killed in Benghazi and then participated in the cover-up of the terrorist attack in which the four Americans died. (a scandal the mainstream media is still reluctant to cover). Now while the present Secretary of State and Administration is still crapping all over the Russian proposal, the former Secretary of State endorses it.  Finally the President goes on six TV networks (he skips Univision because he doesn’t need the Hispanic vote anymore) and not only says he will try and pursue the diplomatic effort his current Secretary of State was backing away from…but it was his idea all along. OK maybe not his Idea but something he discussed with the Russian leader last week at the G20 Summit. The President said he would direct the Secretary of State to follow pursue, but he wouldn’t want Syria to use that as a delaying tactic, but this same President has allowed Iran to use negotiations as a delaying tactic for five years.  When the president was done, the Senate Majority leader and member of the president’s party announces he will delay the Senate war vote to give the president time to explain himself to the American People. But the real reason is the Majority Leader doesn’t have nearly enough votes to pass the war bill.And through this entire thing, one expects John Cleese to show up on the TV screen to complain that the parrot he just purchased was dead.  Continue Reading Yid With Lid ..

(via iOTW) Himes and Blumenthal held a Townhall meeting today at the Darien, Connecticut  Library to discuss with their constituents whether going to Syria is in  Connecticut citizens’ best interest or not.

The room was packed but there was no real discussion that led Blumenthal or  Himes to see things differently, it was more Kabuki theater, with neither ceding  an inch of their steadfast hawkish beliefs. Blumenthal and Himes then informed  the citizenry that the support and opposition for the war was a mixed bag of  opinion, creating the illusion that their opinions are not out of lockstep with  the voters. (more…)

Here’s the White House S.P.I.N….. 

WASHINGTON DC – Secretary of State John Kerry told a closed meeting of House lawmakers that the Russian government is only seeking to help Syria because they believe the U.S. is serious about taking military action, according to multiple sources present.
The comment, which came in a classified briefing of the full House on Monday, mirrors public comments by other Obama administration officials: the threat of a military attack is working to bring the Russians to the negotiating table.
After enduring days of brutal skepticism from lawmakers of both parties, Kerry and other administration officials wasted no time in attempting to link Russia’s proposal to the pressure coming from the White House. Democratic lawmakers agreed.
“This suggestion today by [the Russians] about bring the chemical weapons Assad has under control, I think it’s a direct result of the president saying he’s ready to do whatever is necessary to back up what he’s already said,” Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) said. (link)

The folks who write Saturday Night Live scripts could not have put a finer point on the political hilarity of Monday Sept. 9th any better than what bore out in real life.
First you have Secretary of State, John Kerry, speaking in London ( <- luckily) early in the day, answering a question, and say mockingly: “if Assad gave up his chemical weapons then we would not strike Syria“.

“Sure, he could turn over every single bit of his chemical weapons to the international community in the next week – turn it over, all of it without delay and allow the full and total accounting (of it). “But he isn’t about to do it and it can’t be done.”

This gaffe was jumped on by the Ruskies who said “OK, we’ll take the WMD, Syria will not be able to use it” therefore problem solved.
What happens next is the stuff of SNL legend (watch video)

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