Hagel was always a dimwitted rageaholic alcoholic.
Chuck Hagel was confirmed at the end of February 2013. He didn’t even have a year and a half in his new position before becoming a fall guy.
That must be some kind of record.
And Hagel is pathetically embracing his role. The sad sack who stumbled incompetently through his hearings now stumbles through the motions of taking on the responsibility for the Bergdahl deal, ever since it was announced that it’s his fault.
Hagel, unlike Shinseki, probably won’t pay the ultimate penalty. Not unless Bowe Bergdahl’s first words on camera are, “I love Jihad more than I love peanut butter and jelly”. But the decline has started.
Obama has two kinds of appointees. Those he connects with and will fight for, like Susan Rice, and the expendables, like Hagel. He will fight for them out of ego, but he will sacrifice them if there’s a threat.
Susan Rice might be sent out to lie, but she won’t be sent out to fall on her sword. Chuck Hagel now knows exactly where he stands. Even the famously dimwitted ex-senator can’t be too stupid to realize his place in the scheme of things.
Obama had more respect for Panetta and Petraeus than he does for Hagel.
“We didn’t handle some of this right,” Hagel admitted to the House Armed Services Committee, toward the end of the first public hearing on the prisoner exchange.
In his opening remarks, Hagel also said both he and President Obama were on board with the decision — amid some confusion in Washington over who technically approved the trade. “I want to make one fundamental point — I would never sign any document or make any agreement … that I did not feel was in the best interests of this country,” Hagel said. “Nor would the president of the United States, who made the final decision with the full support of his national security team.”
Is Hagel covertly passing the buck back? He just might be. But don’t make the mistake of thinking Hagel is smart. Ask him a question about a talking point and he folds like Hillary after three margaritas.
He said there was “no direct evidence of any direct involvement in their direct attacks on the United States or any of our troops,” though they were combatants and “part of planning.”
Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, asked him to clarify.
“So your point was they didn’t pull the trigger, but they were senior commanders of the Taliban military who directed operations against the United States?” he asked.
“That’s right,” Hagel said.
It’s another brilliant performance from the woodchuck
Tags: Bowe Bergdahl, Chuck Hagel, Daniel Greenfield, Sultan Knish, Susan Rice
