Mike Pompeo Confirmed by Senate and Sworn in as Head of CIA

Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-KS) has been confirmed by the U.S. Senate and has been sworn in as the Director of the CIA.  Pompeo is the third person appointed by President Donald Trump to be confirmed to his cabinet position, as Senate Democrats and Chuck Schumer play petty party politics in delaying Trump’s choices. The vote was 66-32. Pompeo was sworn in Monday evening by Vice President Pence.

The Senate on Monday confirmed Rep. Mike Pompeo to be director of the CIA, following a spirited debate in which Democrats expressed concern about his stances on domestic surveillance, data collection and torture.

The vote was 66 to 32, with a majority of Democrats voting no — as well as Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky.

Pompeo was subsequently sworn in.

“The president and I are confident in your abilities and know you will rise to the challenge to lead the Central Intelligence Agency,” Vice President Mike Pence said at the swearing-in.

Chris Wallace Grills CIA Director John Brennan on ISIS & Iran … “Didn’t You Give the American People and the President Give the American People a False Sense of Confidence Back in 2012 about Our Fight Against Islamic Terrorists at a Time”

Chris Wallace asks, Director, can we really say ISIS is losing?

Yesterday on Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace interviewed CIA Director John Brennan and asked some very direct questions when it came to the treats from both Iran and ISIS. Wallace asked why the Obama administration refuses to call or enemy for what they are, “Islamic extremists” and why President Obama and John Brennan have rejected identifying them for what they are. Brennan replied that ISIS was simply “a corruption of the Islamic faith.” REALLY? Director Brennen might want to read the Koran. It is not a corruption of the Islam, it is an interpretation that many agree with.

Brennan said the vast majority of Muslims reject ISIS’ actions. Wallace then directly confronted Brennan over why he and the president won’t openly talk about “Islamic extremism.” He asked why the administration is “ignoring” confronting them like that.

Brennan simply insisted that “it is a corruption of the Islamic faith.”

Sadly, the CIA director sounded more like a shill for Barack Obama than truly understanding and caring about the safety and protection of the United States. There were far too many references to touting Barack Obama and John Kerry during this interview as compared to folks like formal CIA director General David Petraeus and Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who are persona non grata with the Obama administration.

FOX NEWS Sunday Full Transcript:

WALLACE: Do you really think that the U.S. and Iran share interests?

BRENNAN: I think what’s Daesh, ISIL has been doing in the region is something that is counter to U.S. interests as well as counter to Iranian interests. And the Iranians are now engaged with their Iraqi partners to try to push back these forces of terrorism inside of Iraq.

So, Iran does have an interest in preventing further Daesh, ISIL terrorist attacks. At the same time, I think they need to be responsible as far as what they’re doing inside Iraq and not further inflaming that situation.

WALLACE: But your immediate predecessor in this job, General David Petraeus, said this week Iran is not an ally. It’s part of the problem, not part of the solution. And Benjamin Netanyahu, when he spoke to Congress, said the enemy of your enemy is not your friend, he is your enemy.  [...]

WALLACE: General Lloyd Austin, the head of the U.S. Central Command, told Congress recently that ISIS is losing. But ISIS is still dug into Iraq and Syria. They now have affiliates across North Africa. They were possibly responsible for these terrible attacks this week in Tunisia and Yemen.

Director, can we really say ISIS is losing?

BRENNAN: Clearly, ISIS momentum inside of Iraq and Syria has been blunted and it has been stopped. So, they are not on the march as they were several months ago. And so, our working with the Iraqis and the Iraqis now trying to push back against it, it is having some great, I think, progress.

At the same time, this phenomenon of Daesh throughout the entire region is something that we need to work with our partners. We see what’s happening in other countries, in these franchises that are blowing up in Libya and other areas. They — they’ve claimed responsibility for attacks in Tunisia and Yemen.

This is something that clearly is not just restricted to Iraq and Syria. So, we cannot relent. We have to continue working with our partners in the region.

WALLACE: Here is what you said in 2012.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRENNAN: If the decade before 9/11 was the time of al Qaeda’s rise and the decade after 9/11 was the time of its decline, then I believe this decade will be the one that sees its demise.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Director Brennan, weren’t you just flat wrong about that?

BRENNAN: No. And when we look at al Qaeda and we look at what has happened to al Qaeda and particularly the core of al Qaeda that was in the area of Afghanistan and Pakistan, they have taken some really big hits.

WALLACE: But — but, respectfully, sir, when you were saying this is the decade of al Qaeda’s demise, I don’t think most people thought you meant, well, yes, but there will be an offshoot called ISIS which spreads across the Middle East.

BRENNAN: This phenomenon that Daesh represents right now is a new one. It is one that has grown up in the past two years.

WALLACE: But it’s an offshoot of al Qaeda.

BRENNAN: We’ve done a lot against al Qaeda. We’ve been able to push them back. We’ve been able to prevent their attacks.

But there are these offshoots, as you say. This is a phenomenon that we’re going to have to deal with. And I do think over the next decade, this is going to be a long, hard fight.

WALLACE: I guess what I’m asking is didn’t you give the American people — and the president give the American people a false sense of confidence back in 2012 about our fight against Islamic terrorists at a time, perhaps not so coincidentally, when the president was running for reelection?

BRENNAN: What we said was al Qaeda was on the run. We said that al Qaeda was really bloodied and it was not the same organization that it was in 9/11, as well as in the years after that.

There was no sense that I think either I or the president or others gave to the American people that terrorism was going away. But we’ve made great progress against a lot of these groups that had plans in place to carry out attacks.

WALLACE: You talked recently of the ideology — your word — that fuels ISIS.

What is that ideology?

BRENNAN: It is a very twisted, perverted interpretation of a religion that they purport to represent, but in no way do they represent. It’s an ideology of violence. That’s what it is. It is not a religious ideology.

WALLACE: Well, Islam is certainly a part of it, isn’t it?

BRENNAN: They purport to be Muslims. But as I said, the overwhelming majority of Muslims throughout the world roundly denounce and condemn what they’re doing. And that’s why we should not give them any type of religious legitimacy.

WALLACE: This gets to your refusal and the president’s refusal to talk about Islamic extremism. (MORE)

Your Tax Dollars at Work … CIA Cash Ended Up Financing Radical Islamist Terrorist Group Al Qaeda

REMEMBER HOW WE WERE TOLD THAT THE UNITED STATES DOES NOT PAY RANSOM FOR HOSTAGES …

As reported at the New York Times, your hard earned tax dollars financing Islamist terrorists. This is just another example that the US government has become too big to succeed. As stated in the article, it was just another in a long list of examples of how the United States, largely because of poor oversight and loose financial controls. In this case, the poor oversight and lack of attention to detail gives hard earned American tax payer dollars to the very evil radical Islamist terrorists we are looking to defeat. UNREAL.

Why does this sound exactly like the brilliance of ‘Fast & Furious’?

In the spring of 2010, Afghan officials struck a deal to free an Afghan diplomat held hostage by Al Qaeda. But the price was steep — $5 million — and senior security officials were scrambling to come up with the money.

They first turned to a secret fund that the Central Intelligence Agency bankrolled with monthly cash deliveries to the presidential palace in Kabul, according to several Afghan officials involved in the episode. The Afghan government, they said, had already squirreled away about $1 million from that fund.

Within weeks, that money and $4 million more provided from other countries was handed over to Al Qaeda, replenishing its coffers after a relentless C.I.A. campaign of drone strikes in Pakistan had decimated the militant network’s upper ranks.

The C.I.A.’s contribution to Qaeda’s bottom line, though, was no well-laid trap. It was just another in a long list of examples of how the United States, largely because of poor oversight and loose financial controls, has sometimes inadvertently financed the very militants it is fighting.

While refusing to pay ransoms for Americans kidnapped by Al Qaeda, the Taliban or, more recently, the Islamic State, the United States has spent hundreds of billions of dollars over the last decade at war in Iraq and Afghanistan, some of which has been siphoned off to enemy fighters.

Daily Commentary – Monday, December 15, 2014 – Whether You Believe it Was Torture or Not

• The recently released Senate report on CIA Torture is a matter of timing

Daily Commentary – Monday, December 15, 2014 Download

Dick Cheney Says Senate Report on CIA Interrogation Techniques is a “Terrible Piece of Work,” “Deeply Flawed” and ‘FULL OF CRAP” (VIDEO)

Former Vice-President Dick Cheney did not hold back in his interview with  Bret Baier on FOX News regarding what he thought of the Senate report on CIA interrogation techniques released by Sen. Dianne Feinstein. Cheney called the report a “terrible piece of work,” “deeply flawed,” and full of bovine scatology. These interrogation methods were not done to punish the enemy combatants, they were performed to extract information so to prevent further attacks following 9-11.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney says a declassified Senate report on the controversial post-9/11 CIA interrogation program is “full of crap.”

“I think it is a terrible report, deeply flawed,” Cheney said on Fox News, his first televised interview since the report’s release. “It’s a classic example of where politicians get together and throw professionals under the bus.”

Cheney said he had not read the entire 6,000-page classified document, drafted by Democrats and their staffs on the Senate Intelligence Committee, or the 500-page declassified and redacted executive summary. But he unequivocally said its findings were flawed and an affront to members of the CIA.

“The notion that the agency was operating on a rogue basis was just a flat out lie,” Cheney said.

He insisted the so-called enhanced interrogation techniques were all legally justified and inconsistent with “torture,” though he conceded that the practice of “rectal rehydration” mentioned in the report, “was not one of the authorized or approved techniques.”

On a personal note, sorry if I don’t lose any sleep over a terrorist was given an enema.

Click HERE to watch VIDEO via FOX News

From Real Clear Politics:

BRET BAIER, FOX NEWS: Sir, did the ends justify the means?

FORMER VICE PRESIDENT DICK CHENEY: Absolutely.

BRET BAIER: No doubt in your mind?

DICK CHENEY: No doubt in my mind, i’m totally comfortable with it. Bret, I think you’ve got to remember partly what was going on as well too during that period of time, we had reporting that al-Qaeda was trying to get their hands on nuclear weapons, that they had been dealing with Pakistanis who after all had nuclear weapons, we had the anthrax attacks, and we had every reason to expect to have a follow on attack. Our job was to keep the country safe and secure and get those guys who hit us on 9/11. That’s exactly what we did, and the professionals int he intelligence community, especially at the CIA did one hell of a job.

Legal Insurrection opines, “Pity they were too incapacitated by an enema to kill more Americans”. Amen brother!